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PC 2004 06 15CHANHASSEN PLANNING COMMISSION REGULAR MEETING JUNE 15, 2004 Chairman Sacchet called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. MEMBERS PRESENT: Uli Sacchet, Dan Keefe, Rich Slagle, Steve Lillehaug and Bethany Tjornhom MEMBERS ABSENT: Craig Claybaugh and Kurt Papke STAFF PRESENT: Bob Generous, Senior Planner; Sharmeen A1-Jaff, Senior Planner; and Matt Saam, Assistant City Engineer PUBLIC HEARING: REOUEST FOR SITE PLAN APPROVAL TO EXPAND THE PARKING LOT (143 SPACES} FOR WESTWOOD COMMUNITY CHURCH WITH SECONDARY ACCESS TO HIGHWAY 41, AND A WETLAND ALTERATION PERMIT TO ALTER AND FILL WETLANDS ON SITE ON PROPERTY ZONED OFFICE AND INSTITUTIONAL DISTRICT, OI, LOCATED AT 3121 WESTWOOD DRIVE (WEST OF TH 41 AT TANADOONA DRIVE}-PLANNING CASE NO. 04-20. Public Present: Name Address Dan Russ James Haugen Mark Ekb Maren Christopher Bruce Carlson Peter Brandt 51 Choctaw Circle 7800 Bavaria Road, Victoria 3360 Bavaria Road, Chaska 7311 Dogwood Road 1440 Bavaria Road 7570 Dogwood Road Bob Generous presented the staff report on this item. Sacchet: Thank you Bob. Questions from staff. Any? You want to jump in Steve? Start with Rich? Slagle: No, no, Steve can go ahead. Lillehaug: Bob, you indicated that this will possibly be extended to Dogwood Road in the future, out to the west. Will it also be, will that be connected to Crimson Bay Road and then onto Trunk Highway 5 or will that remain separate? Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Generous: That would be staff's recommendation that we make that connection eventually, as those properties develop. Lillehaug: So then really in essence this frontage road in the future will most likely, possibly connect back up with Trunk Highway 5? Generous: Yes. That's what our comp plan would like to see is that connection. Lillehaug: Okay. I'm not too sure where to begin here. We don't have current traffic volumes proposed or anything from MnDot, was that correct Matt? Saam: That's correct. Lillehaug: Okay. Saam: For West 78th Street. Lillehaug: For the west leg, right. Saam: Yes. Lillehaug: ! posed a couple of these questions earlier to staff and ! want to hit on one that's most important ! guess in my mind, and the question would be, is the median that we're removing on West 78th Street. We just put that median, ! mean that's a brand new frontage road and we have medians, ! mean they're brand new medians. I've got a huge line of justification why we would need a median there. It appears that staff and the developer plan on taking that median out. Why do we want to go to a lesser standard? In this case. ! mean it seems like we're going the wrong direction. We're not, to me it's not the time we should be retrofitting an intersection in here. ! mean this is a brand new frontage road. It appears it's going to connect back all the way to the west to Trunk Highway 5. ! mean there's possibly going to be through movements through that intersection in the future that may have some higher levels than some of the other intersections that have medians on it. ! guess my concerns and questions is, are we sure we want to get rid of that median in there? And ! know MnDot's reviewed this but maybe not the right people at MnDot have reviewed this at this time. So can staff comment on that? Saam: Sure. Staff, as you said met with MnDot along with the developer's engineer. We also sent this plan over to their review agency as we do with all developments that are proposed along state highways. And both of them came back with basically the same response that removal of the median is fine with them. They don't see issues with delineation and channelization of traffic. Going east to west there. One thing ! guess I'd like to point out is when you go west of Highway 41, we as staff have always kind of thought that's more a lower volume type road. You've got two residential cul-de-sacs and the lake. It's not like traffic from Victoria's going to be coming through there. At least in our mind, and if we would connect up with Crimson Bay, we've always 2 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 envisioned that the Highway 5, the existing Highway 5 access for Crimson Bay would be a right-in/right-out then. So it's not like we'll, in our eyes be getting the truck traffic through this intersection. It will just be another way out for the Dogwood Crimson Bay folks, and then of course Westwood Church on Sundays and whatever other days they have activities. So we're sure willing to look at it again and push MnDot a little harder on you know, do we see any need for a median with upgrades of 41 in the future or anything like that, but at this point they said they don't see the need for it. We've reviewed it at staff, both the City Engineer and ! have and really the only condition that we've come up with is what I've added in there is the free right for the traffic going north on 41 onto eastbound West 78th. They have a painted island. We'd like to see that raised concrete island so. Lillehaug: You hit on another question ! guess ! had is the reconstruction of 41. Have we or are there plans that we can look at to coordinate this intersection? ! mean because ! want to make a comment on it. ! think this frontage road is maybe a couple years old. We, taxpayers, city, state just paid to put a median in there. Now we're taking it back out and we're not planning on replacing it. ! want to try to help and make sure everyone's aware that 41 is being reconstructed and hopefully we're looking at those plans and coordinating this intersection with those plans. Saam: I'll defer to Bob on the 41 improvements but it's been my understanding, maybe ! jumped the gun. Really that's not in the MnDot 20 year plan yet. There are you know talk of future 41 upgrade and river crossing and all that but, ! think Bob's on a committee and it's 20 plus years out so. Generous: It doesn't show up yet. Lillehaug: Okay. Well that answers that. Now let me try to hurry along here. ! think that's all the questions ! have for right now. Thanks. Oh, one more if ! can. On page 7 of the staff report, you indicate the city has retained the services of a traffic engineer to look at the proposed intersection and layout. We have a plan in front of us with the proposed section. With the proposed intersection and layout. Are we saying we're having a traffic engineer look at this after we already have the plans for this intersection? Saam: Yep, we've hired the services of a traffic engineer to make sure that based on future traffic and church anticipated traffic, that what we're doing at that intersection, as you alluded to, is right and that that intersection's going to work and function with the expected traffic. Lillehaug: Okay, thanks. Sacchet: Alright, you can ask more questions if you have more later. Anybody else want to jump in? Slagle: I've got a few. Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: Go ahead Rich. Slagle: Bob or Matt, the comments that were just brought up by Commissioner Lillehaug on that median. Do you have a ballpark figure as to what it cost to build that median and what it will cost to remove that median? Just ballpark. Saam: No, but possibly the applicant. ! know they're doing cost estimates on that. They may have a figure on the removal of it. But ! don't off the top of my head. Sacchet: The applicant pays for the removal. Saam: Yes. Yeah, and our reasoning there is that even, whether it's a driveway or a public street, we want those accesses to line up so those intersection improvements would need to be done. Regardless. Slagle: Okay. Bob, this might be a question for you. Traffic flow of the additional parking lot. One ways, both ways, do you know? Generous: Both ways. Slagle: Both ways, okay. And then question of sidewalks to what ! will call the east and now the proposed northeast or north parking lot. ! don't see any sidewalks similar to the one that is directly northwest of the church. Do we have any of those? ! mean I'm just trying to think if you're parking you know in that northern lot. Is there a sidewalk that folks can walk along to get to the church? Do we know? Generous: Not for any.., length, no. Slagle: Okay, so hypothetically if you're up on the northeast corner of that new parking lot you are walking through a parking lot. Generous: Through a parking lot. Slagle: Okay. ! think that's it for now. Thanks. Keefe: ! have a couple. Landscaping on the Tanadoona Drive side. What are we doing in regards to that or what are we requiring? Generous: There's very minimal landscaping on that Tanadoona Drive itself. The primary landscaping are those island areas that they have in there, which is uniform with the rest of the project. Jill reviewed this. She didn't have, bring up any issues on it. Keefe: And how far from the, just from Tanadoona does that parking lot start? 60? 70? Generous: Yeah, 65 feet. 4 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Keefe: Alright. And at the entrance where 41 connects with West 78th, there's a fair grade change from 41 to, up onto the West 78th and then there's a number of trees that line that road, you know 41 along there. Is it proposed that a lot of those trees would come out or I'm just curious. Generous: Within the roadway I'm sure they'll come out. Saam: Yes, and then even a few. They're proposing right now, we mentioned in the staff report a few trees on the northeast corner of the Arboretum property would be required to come out, and that's just for tying back in with the grading and the sloping, and to avoid like a wall out in the right-of-way which I'm sure MnDot wouldn't allow. Keefe: And then the proposed sign that goes in there. It's similar to the other one on Tanadoona, is that right? The proposed signage for Westwood. Generous: ! don't know that. Saam: Maybe the applicant, you can ask him. Keefe: Alright, that's it. Sacchet: Any questions Bethany? Tjornhom: MnDot advised moving an existing driveway for this project. Does that driveway, is that a private driveway or does that driveway belong to the church? Generous: It's the houses that the church purchased for the access. Tjornhom: Okay, so there's no other party involved in? Generous: No. Tjornhom: And then did they work out their easement they needed with the Arboretum? Generous: ! don't know that they have yet. Saam: That's probably an applicant question. Tjornhom: Okay. Sacchet: I've got a few questions too. First of all, staff report page 4 talks about how the wetland credits work, and it says the applicant cannot draw on what was done previously because they didn't declare it as such. Is that accurate? Generous: Yes. Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: So they basically have to do a little more wetland mitigation to the tune of 13,000-14,000 square feet. Do we know where they would do that? Would they just make the one that they're doing a little bigger? Generous: Yes, they'd make the ones on site larger. Sacchet: And they're okay with that? Well ! guess ! can ask them themselves about that. Trees. It was interesting. You brought up trees here. ! don't see any tree inventory or indication where there are trees. Are we not touching any of the existing trees? Are there no trees in the way? Generous: Not on the parking lot portion. As part of the West 78th Street I'm sure there are trees. Sacchet: Well yeah, there's a canopy part and we don't know how much gets cut there. It doesn't seem to be very much, is that why it's not looked at? Saam: I'm not sure why Jill didn't comment on that. I guess I never asked her really if she had issue with the trees that were coming out on West 78th Street, so that's something good we might follow up on. Sacchet: Well it's hard to preserve a tree in the middle of the roadway but it'd still be nice to know what we're actually cutting down. There's a very sizable retaining wall just south of the new road towards 41. That's where it is, right? Is that okay? ! mean it says up to 9 feet. It's pretty close to the roadway. Will there be a fence or? Saam: You know it's on the side opposite the trail. ! guess that's something we could add in as a condition to add that fence. Sacchet: Safety wise we wouldn't probably, ! mean actually even more so if cars go over that edge, it wouldn't be very funny. Saam: Yeah, ! know adjacent to trails they require that. I'm not sure as a standard the building, it's governed by the building department. They permit it. I'm not sure if as a standard they require a fence. Sacchet: Okay. Well if the trail would be there it might be fenced but since it's next to a road, it might be a guardrail. Saam: No, yeah. A guardrail, something of that nature would be, yeah ! agree. Sacchet: Okay. So that's something we need to look at. Just temporary parking drive. That's an interesting phenomena there. Temporary road. It's my understanding from the staff report that staff thinks it should be done with curb and gutter. The applicant proposes to do it without curb or gutter with their justification that it's temporary. Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Saam: Yeah, technically if you follow the letter of the code, all driveways such as the West 78th Street one, if it was a public, has to be curb and gutter. Pavement to this use. But in talking with the developer, with the church, they plan on doing other parking expansions. They're not sure if the exact alignment of the driveway is going to stay the same so they'd like to not have to invest the money in concrete curb and gutter right now. They have agreed to put in bituminous curb and gutter, which ! know we've done in the other certain areas as a temporary measure. And then we also said we'd add a condition, if and when you develop west of the existing church, then at that point you'll have to bring up that driveway to current standards, which would be the permanent. Sacchet: And you're fine with the tar curb at this point. Saam: ! guess yeah. We felt that was. Sacchet: That's a good balance yeah. You touched on the driveway for the house. Another condition that MnDot brought into the picture is that the turning lanes on 41, the right turn lanes ! guess that is, must be longer and more tapered and all there's enough space for all that? Saam: Yes. yeah there is. can do it... In my mind there is. The developer might not be that happy to do it but And ! know they want to have discussions with MnDot on seeing if they Sacchet: And that is all the developer's financial responsibility? Saam: Yes, and that's a standard MnDot the 300 feet with the taper. Sacchet: In terms of the financial responsibility for this road, basically the developer does everything except the city pays the difference from smaller roads to the bigger road. Is that? Saam: That's basically it, yeah. Oversizing from a 26. Sacchet: The developer is taking care of all the fixing of the intersection and all these turn lanes and islands and what have you. Okay. ! just want to be very clear about that. That's all my questions. Slagle: I've got just a couple more. Sacchet: Yeah, go ahead. Slagle: ! apologize for not asking about the trail. As I'm looking at the plans here ! guess Matt it runs on the north side of West 78th Street, on the west of 41. It will go all the way to the new development to the west, correct? And probably connect to Crimson Bay and Dogwood perhaps. Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Saam: When we upgrade those, the plan is that sidewalk and/or trail at that time. Slagle: Okay. And if we go back to the development across 41, Plowshares. If I'm not mistaken we had a trail coming out of the development on the north end of West 78th to 41 and then going north on the east side of 41 connecting with Longacres and what not. My question is, is how are people to connect to the trail on the other side of 417 Is it going to be marked as a crossing? Because ! don't think we have lights and ! think stop signs are only on West 78th. Right? So is it going to be sort of like a Powers Boulevard where people look both ways and hope there's a gap and. Saam: For the interim and, unless a light would be warranted in the future, yeah. That's what it would have to be at this point. Slagle: Okay. And then my last question raised by the Chair on the intersection and the bearing of the cost. If ! go back 2 years ago when there was discussions of potential development to the west of this property. There was some discussion as to sharing of costs and so forth. ! guess my question is, are the future developers to the west, can ! ask why they're not incurring some costs for this. Saam: We're, we as the city are looking at ways to share that cost. The city's portion. To see who benefits basically from the extension of the public road. The property immediately to the west, which is ! think the one you're referring to, that's about the only one that could benefit. So we're exploring those options. Right now but that's really not this applicant's issue. It's you know city and Westwood are doing this and then it's kind of on our shoulders as a city to see if, can we assess our cost then to other benefiting properties. Slagle: So ! guess in hearing that, I'm going to make an assumption that ! trust will be fair to all parties, that if there is some benefit realized or gained, that that will be appropriated if you will or requested from them. Saam: Yes, definitely and then we won't, ! mean we're bound by the law you know we can't. Slagle: ! understand. Saam: Assess any more than we can show true benefit for so. Slagle: Okay. Sacchet: Steve. Lillehaug: I've got one more. The west end of 78th Street. ! don't see anywhere where there's a turn around plan for that, i.e. temporary cul-de-sac or something like that. Do we have something in the mix for that or am ! just not seeing it? Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Saam: I know it was mentioned. It may not, I'll look to see if it didn't make the conditions. We intend to put that in with a sign. ! could have swore we had that, with the temporary barricade sign saying this street to be extended in the future. Sacchet: ...turn around ! believe. Saam: It doesn't? Sacchet: I'm not sure. ! don't recall. Generous: Condition 21. On page 9. Lillehaug: Okay. Sacchet: So it is in there? Saam: We miss a couple but not all of them. Slagle: You do a great job. Keefe: I've got one more question in relation to, on the bottom of page 5 and top of page 6 you talk about the runoff rates for the culverts, and apparently the Arboretum has a concern about the culverts running. Can you clarify, it says in the last sentence that the applicant may want to work with them. I'm not clear on what all that means. Saam: Let me just give you a little background. These comments under storm water management come from our Water Resource Coordinator. Her comments a lot of times are similar to mine. Basically this applicant, like every developer is required to meet the runoff rates for storm water leaving it's property to match the existing conditions for the post development so they're required to meet the existing runoff rates, whether, ! mean they want to work with the Arboretum or not, we're going to make sure that they meet what's going towards the Arboretum now. Keefe: Right, so if the Arboretum has a concern, as long as they meet the same as they currently are, then there's really no change correct? Saam: Exactly. Exactly. And usually it gets better, meaning less water being dumped on a neighbor so to speak. Sacchet: Okay? Is that for questions from staff. Alright. With that I'd like to invite the applicant to come forward to see if you have anything more to add. Give us a little overview if you'd like. And if you want to state your name and address for the record please. Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Dan Russ: Sure. My name's Dan Russ. I'm on the construction and committee for the Westwood, Westwood Community Church. ! live at 51 Choctaw Circle in Chanhassen. I'm a resident of Chan. ! think there were a number of questions brought up that ! think Matt had addressed. ! think there was three that we want to kind of help you out with. First was on the landscaping on the, what would be the north end of the parking lot between there and Tanadoona. There is existing landscaping that was required during the first site plan so there is already a buffer of trees, shrubs that were required under the original construction so we're not going to disturb any of that and we're adding additional on the end of the parking lot. And then the landscaping is going to be consistent with the existing landscaping that's in there with the grove of cherry trees that are in the islands now so that will continue forward. The median cut that was talked about. That's not driven by the church. You know we're paying for it but that's not drive by us. ! mean our preference would be to leave that intersection alone but city staff' s requiring us to make an alignment of that based on where our property lines are and what we're dealing with with the Arboretum, we don't have any additional property to the south to make that median and intersection line line up so we've got to turn the other intersection. ! think that's what's driving that cost. We'd love nothing better than to leave that alone and not have to pay for that but ! think the traffic people are telling us what's the best for that intersection. We'll go by what they say. And the easement, ! believe there was a question of the easement with the Arboretum. We presently own the two houses on the corner. The driveway easement is there so we control that easement through the ownership of that property so we don't anticipate an easement issue with the Arboretum other than potentially grading when we're doing some construction there in the corner so there's a construction grading easement that is probably needed. Other than that ! don't have really much other to add then the church is growing. Oh, the turn around. I'm sorry. There was a question on turn around. ! think our proposal, or one of our conversations earlier with the city staff was that we would merely terminate the road at the driveway point so the turn around could be used as our driveway. There is no reason for anybody to drive up that road. The church is looking into that as a safety issue for parking at night or partying or whatever might happen on a dead end road. It would be lit with, per city standards but we just as soon not have any traffic up there as well so we'd just as soon have it terminate at our property. That would be the, our resolution to that. Sacchet: Does staff have a comment about that? Because I wonder, I mean when that road needs to be further extended, how that would be handled. Saam: And ! think maybe we're not talking about the same thing. It sounds like Mr. Russ is talking about a turn around up in the development. We're talking about a temporary turn around at your property line. It's pretty standard for us. Dan Russ: Like a hammer head or a cul-de-sac? Saam: Yeah, temporary cul-de-sac, yep. 10 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Dan Russ: Whatever. I mean one of the proposals that we talked about at one point I thought was, we would terminate the road... Sacchet: I'm trying to ask whether that is from a city viewpoint whether that's a viable option but you understand what he's saying? Dan Russ: Yeah. Sacchet: End the road where the driveway goes off. You have like a hammer head turn around. Saam: Yeah, for public accesses where you're going to be maintaining it, and ! guess our standard is to have a cul-de-sac type. Sacchet: Have it all the way because then it becomes an issue when we need the connection, how it gets built and how the costs get shared and all that. Saam: And that would be part of the city's cost... Sacchet: Cost to go past their driveway? Saam: Yeah. Sacchet: Okay, but we would want to do it now? ! mean if the city costs anyhow, it could be questioned whether that's even smart. Saam: Excuse me? Sacchet: If the city pays for extending that road from their driveway to the end of the property line, which basically goes nowhere, why would we want to do it now and not wait until it actually goes somewhere? Saam: You're saying basically wait until the development to the west comes in and then build the public street. Sacchet: Nobody's going to use that road at this point. Saam: We could look at it, yeah. We could definitely look at that. It's something we haven't thought of. Sacchet: Because if it's city cost...but if it's city cost anyhow, then it would be for the benefit of the adjoining property and when they need it, they would have an interest and they'll pay you for it. And nobody's going to use it now, logically it would make more sense that way. Then that would actually accommodate what you're saying. 11 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Dan Russ: Correct. I mean our need is for the road, the church at this point. We had looked at an earlier option where we would bring our driveway in on the eastern half of the property to accommodate future buildings that are going to come up here and future parking lots. This is the logical point for us to get to at some point and as long as we're doing it, crossing the, doing the mitigation, all the things we're doing, we might as well do it. Sacchet: You're envisioning that the access would be pretty much in that, staying in that place then. Dan Russ: Within 10 or 15 feet of where we're at there based on our future sanctuary and we have a parking lot, correct. Sacchet: Anyhow, are there more questions of the applicant? Slagle: I've got one. Sacchet: Go ahead Rich. Slagle: Dan, if we can touch upon the, what I'll call the sidewalks. That parking lot directly to the north of the main entrance, where you've got the diagonal cross overs if you will for people to walk, ! know the one to the east we don't have that but ! know we have the sidewalk coming from the side of the building but do you feel by adding that northern parking lot and not having any type of what I'm going to call safe passage. Dan Russ: Pedestrian walkway. Slagle: Yeah. Is that a concern? Dan Russ: You know we haven't thought about it in that light and we probably should. If ! remember right... You know the way those driveways, or the parking lots were designed, there were collectors down at this point and the sidewalks either into the lower level church or up to the upper level. Slagle: If ! can make a suggestion. Where that sidewalk terminates, the one that comes out of the main entrance and goes northeast. If there was a way to carry that on along that island if you will, or the east side of the driveway northward. Yep, going up there. And that's where we typically have guards, and then you would carry it up again, and then possibly have one or two, you know one in, centered of the islands. Yep, so people can make their way, yep. ! mean ! just know with two little kids, it makes it easier when you're on a sidewalk. Dan Russ: Well we want to do what's right, that's safe so. Slagle: So you guys would be open to that? 12 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Dan Russ: I think so. I think we should do that. Slagle; Okay. Is staff okay with that? Dan Russ: ! would say we'd follow that lead. Good point. Slagle: Okay. That's it. Lillehaug: ! do have a question. Sacchet: Go ahead Steve. Lillehaug: I'm really having problems, not with anything that you're doing on your site. It really has to do with this frontage road and intersection, so could you help me here and explain why are we putting this road in. ! think you hit on it a little bit that you need a, you want a second outlet for safety reasons. Is it generating more because the, how do you say it, the Tanadoona intersection is very inadequate? Can you comment a little on that please. Dan Russ: Sure. The original site plan that was approved in '02 ! believe, allowed us to have the amount of parking that we have in Phase I, for the first building with access on Tanadoona with an upgrade on Tanadoona. The traffic study that we did indicated ! think at that point that if we built any more building or added more square footage, increased people on there, we were going to need a secondary access. So the master site plan, correct me if I'm wrong, was approved with one access point. Any additional buildings would require a second access point. At this point we need additional parking to handle what we've are going to find the increase in our worship services in worshippers during the Sunday service so that's why we're adding another 140 spots to allow us to add another service for the holidays. That's typically when it ramps up. And with that, we're going to need that secondary street. It's certainly going to have to come when we come back for our gymnasium, recreational building. That is next on our list. Hopefully we're back here in the next 6 months to a year talking about that project, and that would drive West 78th Street need as well, so we're looking for a multiple purpose here. One is to get a little bit ahead of the curve. Two is to add a secondary access for the people that are there, which will allow us easier flow in and out of there and we won't have to have the county and the state, the highway patrol people on 41 in the rain, in the dark dodging cars, trying to get people to turn in and out of there. Works fine in the daylight but our evening services are getting difficult for public safety so we'd like to run them in a different entrance that's a little more safe and little more controlled. Lillehaug: Okay. One more question. Are you saying right now that your parking is inadequate for just your services and building alone as it stands? Dan Russ: ! wouldn't use the word inadequate. Lillehaug: Well use another term. 13 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Dan Russ: We now operate some shuttle buses to and from, offer rural parking that allows us to schedule our service times a little closer together to accommodate worship and Sunday school classes as such. And with more parking it will ease that burden. It's difficult to accommodate 2,500 to 3,000 people on a Sunday morning when you need facilities and staff and teachers that come and park, and then their cars don't move for 3 hours when you have regular worshippers coming in and out so the parking gets tight. During the week there isn't, you know we're grossly over parked during the week for our normal church operations, but the Sunday services gets tight. So the additional parking is a definitely will help us in our existing facility and will allow us to move forward into the next phase. Lillehaug: Okay, thank you. Keefe: I've got kind of a follow on question to that. In regards to, I've been personal witness to the traffic person out there and we're adding a second entrance to this now. At least in your look at this intersection as proposed, ! mean do you still think there's going to be a need for some sort of traffic control on Sunday mornings even with the addition of this? Dan Russ: That ! can't tell you. I'm not qualified to make that call, although ! can tell you that MnDot is requiring us to put a 300 some odd foot right hand decel turning lane and 150 foot acceleration lane, which we don't have at Tanadoona now. So you're able to slow down, pull over, take a right hand turn to come in. Keefe: So that's someone coming down from the north, right. Dan Russ: From the north on 41. Keefe: Right. Dan Russ: The width of the intersection ! think allows for a turning lane in the center of 41, or not. Saam: Yeah, left. Dan Russ: A left hand turn land so coming north... Keefe: So there's actually two lanes going north on 41. Is that correct, at the new. Saam: There will be a dedicated left and then one lane for going. Keefe: Bypass, okay. Saam: Yeah. 14 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Dan Russ: And with MnDot, you know MnDot's reviewed it. They said that based on our traffic counts and the needs, it doesn't require a light at this point. There isn't enough traffic on that intersection. On either intersection to require a light. Keefe: ! guess kind of a one point time, 9:00-10:00 or whenever. Dan Russ: Yeah, from 9:300 to noon it gets a little tough and hopefully with two access points it's going to cut it half. So ! don't know the answer to that, whether or not we'll need some assistance with state or county. Public safety. Slagle: Can I just dovetail on that if I may. And Dan, I appreciate your honesty because obviously none of us know for sure what the need will be from a safety standpoint, but I'm thinking, and staff help me here. When we're looking at an intersection that's going to have two stop lights, or excuse me, two stop signs, obviously the majority of the traffic would be coming from the east trying to cross 41 to go to the service to the new entrance. You have cars coming from the south on 41 taking a left going straight. You have them coming from the north, you know going south and maybe some taking a right probably. Although if they're coming from the north they might be doing the Tanadoona. Dan Russ: That would be my guess. Is people from the north would stay in the Tanadoona Drive because that's the first drive they get to, and people coming from the south hearing north are going to go here because that's the first drive they get to. Slagle: And so ! raise just this thought for consideration and that is if it was a light you wouldn't hear the question raised because to me that gives all directions 30 seconds to go through. To think that at the peak times that people are going to want to try and shoot across 41 with no police officers stopping traffic, you know for again those small amount of times albeit a few hours on a Sunday ! think is really asking for a potential situation, so I'm going to throw out, it's a question but it's also a comment. That maybe we consider having public safety and I'll ask staff to look into it, for some time. You know in other words, let's try this for 2 months. See what happens. Get people's feedback and if they don't think we need it, great. But ! would hate to think that we're going to start without elevating it to the safest level and then work our way down. Dan Russ: I think it's the church's position that we would definitely want to control safety. If there was an issue there, we would not hesitate to have... Slagle: ! understand. Dan Russ: The last think we want is an accident there with injuries of any kind, whether it's our church people or neighbors or anyone else moving on that road system. Keefe: And believe it or not, ! think at least when ! drove by there on a Sunday morning, ! think the traffic volume was heavy enough, and ! don't know for sure but it didn't, they were waiting to get in this new entrance. Then they stack all the way back to 41 to 5. There may be that many cars coming up that way. ! just don't know for sure. 15 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Dan Russ: I don't know. I mean our traffic people have told us that that's not the case. Slagle: See this dovetails on the question earlier about the traffic study that we don't have in front of us, and ! understand that it's just not here. And I'm not suggesting this is premature without that, but boy I'm hoping staff, you're going to shake your heads yes that we'll just do everything we can to make sure these are safe and work our way down. Dan Russ: Now MnDot looked at the intersection and they didn't, they didn't warrant a traffic study, is that right? Saam: Correct. Yeah, they took traffic counts out there and. Dan Russ: They waived it, so I'm not sure what they were looking at or when. They were looking at the roadways but. Sacchet: Traffic study's expected to be in place before it goes to council. Saam: Correct. Yeah. Sacchet: Because that's very important. Okay. Any more questions of the applicant? I've got a few questions too. In terms of the wetland mitigation, you guys are fine with what the situation is? This is kind of a bummer that it wasn't declared when you had some credits and now you're being told that you can't draw on them because you didn't declare them. When ! read that ! thought whoa. Dan Russ: It's difficult but it is what it is and we're going to have to abide by it and we appreciate the city' s. Sacchet: You just make the thing a little bigger. There's plenty of room and all? Dan Russ: Well, we have land. We're losing more land than we anticipated which will impact the church's ability to expand on that parcel. But we are where we are and we'll have to do what... Sacchet: Do you know where you're going to expand? Like you make what part you're expanding out a little bit further to the west or something like that? Dan Russ: Well the expansion as we anticipate our next phase would be our multi purpose building what we'll call it. Sacchet: ! mean the wetland expansion. Dan Russ: Oh, the wetland expansion. Yeah, we're okay with what's happening there... It expanded into usable ground. 16 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: Just go around the edge a little further, is that the idea? Dan Russ: Right. Just have to make it bigger. Sacchet: Alright. And with the trees, there are not any significant trees that are coming out because of the road or do you know? Dan Russ: Well people have different opinions of trees and quality of trees. To me they're in the lower wetland type trees. They're not as permanent, beautiful hardwoods that we have along the corridor, along here and the church's position has always been preservation of anything that we can and we've done our best to mitigate removal of trees but there are some trees down there in that lower wetland area. Those beautiful cottonwood that snow in July. There's some of those that down there that we're going to lose but we'll get over that. Sacchet: And you understand, you found a balance about the temporary road with making it bituminous curb and gutter. Dan Russ: Yes. Sacchet: That's not an issue anymore. ! think that's all my questions. Dan Russ: And we're working with the city on the cost associated with it and I think we're finding a nice balance there. We have met with the Carlson and the Brandt people to the west of us. Bruce is here and he has involvement in our development is instrumental. We're trying to facilitate him for future use of utilities, water and sewer through the water and sewer that we have connected to the property. And the roadway ! think meets with his standards and what he wants and it will line up with his piece right SO. Sacchet: Is there water and sewer going through that roadway? Saam: Not at this time but that is a possibility as the church and Mr. Carlson continue to talk. Sacchet: That it will go through that land. Saam: Possibly. And it would come down the whole length, it'd probably come down from the middle of the site. Maybe in the temporary road, something like that. Dan Russ: We've got sewer service to our facility that will accommodate our three buildings but we've got a system in which we can increase the capacity and as good stewards of the community we'd let him hook onto our system if you will, which then hooks on up in Tanadoona to service his future development so we're in agreement with that. 17 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: Excellent. Thank you very much. Dan Russ: You're welcome. Now this is a public hearing. Or are there more applicant comments? ! don't know, you had several applicant people right? Sacchet: Alright. This is a public hearing so anybody wants to come forward and comment to this application, this project, this is your turn. Seeing nobody, yes. Please come forward if you want to say something. State your name and address for the record and let us hear what you have to say please. Maren Christopher: And so my concern don't know if this roadway now. We My name is Maren Christopher and ! live on 7311 Dogwood Road. is hearing that West 78th could possibly connect to Dogwood, and ! is a premature concern because they're talking about a temporary aren't talking about extending it but ! did hear that tonight. And ! heard extending to Crimson Bay Road, which then I'm assuming Crimson Bay would connect to Dogwood and have the 78 Street connection. So ! wanted to voice my concerns. I'm wondering where to go with this. Sacchet: Well actually, ! don't know whether all of us were here when this came before and we heard very pronounced opposition from the residents to anything connecting in that area. On the other hand it's my understanding that the comprehensive plan has envisioned there being a connection all along, so we have kind of a clash of two visions here. So is it premature? Well, in one hand it's probably too late you could say because the comprehensive plan was done what, 10, 15 years ago when that was envisioned. On the other hand, it isn't there and it seems like the residents don't want it. ! don't know, any comments from engineering viewpoint on that Matt please. Saam: Sure. ! guess before anything like that would happen, there'd be a public process just for that. Again while this may set in motion something that could ultimately connect them, this isn't connecting them. So again that would be a separate project and public hearings and everything on it at some time in the future so ! guess that's what ! would offer up. Just like any, the Carlson development, if that were to go. There'd be, he'd come in. We'd see the sewer and water plans at that time so they are separate but aligned. Maren Christopher: At that time are you considering sewer and water for Dogwood? Saam: We would, ! mean we'd love to see that yeah because of the septic issues out there but again at this time that's not on the table as of yet. Maren Christopher: Okay, so just wait? Saam: Yeah. 18 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Slagle: If ! can comment, just as a citizen. ! wouldn't just wait. Get involved. You know certainly contact some of your neighbors and voice your thoughts to whether it'd be staff. Maren Christopher: I would say we're probably mostly all in agreement. I don't know, there's only 2 of us here and Peter is involved in, he's one of the developers of this property. So I don't know if he has a conflict of interest. And I don't know why none of our other neighbors are here. Usually we all turn out en masse so I'm just amazed. Sacchet: Well this is not an aspect that's really connected, as was pointed out. I mean we're not looking at connecting at this point. Does it make a connection that brings it a little close? Yes, it's halfway there but. Maren Christopher: I know. It's getting closer and I don't want to not speak out. Slagle: Stay involved. Sacchet: Alright, well I appreciate, and it's important that you express that because we all work together. Thank you. Appreciate it. Any other comments? If not, I will close the public hearing. Bring it back to commissioners for comments and discussion. Who wants to start? Should we do the ladies first? Tjornhom: You know I don't have a comment to lead. Lillehaug: I'll start it ifI can. Sacchet: Go ahead Steve. Lillehaug: I guess I just want to get this out there. Commissioner Slagle said he didn't want to throw out there that this is premature but I think it is. I have so many notes here. Unanswered questions so I'm just going to start big picture items. I think this is being built because of the inadequacies of Tanadoona. That's my first comment. It's definitely important to have another connector though with that parking lot for safety. I definitely agree with that. But do we put this road in now and build a full intersection? I mean we don't have a traffic study done. I think we hugely have the cart before the horse here. I think my opinion is I would rather see this road temporary all the way out to Trunk Highway 41 right now. The only purpose of this road right now is to serve the parking lot and possibly help preserve right-of-way in the future for a local road to connect up with the west. I think it' s premature. We were sitting up here trying to analyze the traffic and MnDot doesn't have traffic numbers. City doesn't have traffic numbers. We don't have any traffic numbers for this intersection and the geometrics are being set right in front of us already. That's not, in my mind that's not how you build this intersection. For that one reason it's premature. Where else do I go? And I hate talking negative about this. I mean the developer's doing everything possible he can so somehow I want to help this out but I don't think a permanent intersection in the roadway is the answer right now. MnDot has reviewed this but they're not concerned with costs for the future. 19 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 They know the city is going to bury these costs when we go into this intersection again and remove, add median, whatever we have to do there when this road connects up to the west. They're not looking at the cost of what it will take the city to retrofit this intersection again. ! mean we just looked at it 2 years ago, whatever it was when we put, when that intersection was made. We put a median in there. Now we're taking it out. We're going to go back and forth here because we don't know what's going on to the west yet and ! think ! could point out other areas in the city where we tried doing the same thing, up Powers and over there in the Kerber development where this little area was reserved right-of-way and 20 years later we had problems with it and we just dealt with that. This probably wouldn't be that extensive of a case that we would have to deal with but you know, cart before the horse. We saw that first hand. What else here? ! have to put my page back. The traffic study. It should just simply be done before we're at this level here. ! don't support moving forward without that. Removing that existing median, no way. And then ! want to. Slagle: If I can just ask a question. Sorry to interrupt but to you and because of your position outside of this commission, and then also direct to staff. ! mean is there a reason this wasn't done? Saam: You mean the traffic study? Slagle: Yeah. Saam: Logistically we need the layouts before the traffic engineer can review it. And then it's just the timing issue. And this was the first time and we were doing the new, doing it the new way I'll call it where the city is getting in escrow from the, ! mean all that takes time to get the proposal. To get a consultant on board and get him going and so ! guess we as staff didn't want to hold up the developer at this point when they submit because of that. When they're willing to fund it and get everything for us. Work with us on the public street and everything like that so. Sacchet: Is that all Steve? Lillehaug: Sure, I'll try to shorten this up. Again ! disagree with removing the median. The median exists on this frontage road almost at every single intersection as it exists right now except for Powers on the west side. You know if you look at this intersection, the proper course of travel isn't immediately obvious without the help of channelization by these medians. It's not easy to follow. ! think continuity is in question when you go, when you flow around that intersection and all the different turning movements due to the approach alignments of 78th. 78th Street, there's a slight skew. There is non-symmetry of that intersection and if you look at the radii coming up to that intersection, you know they're not two tangent sections coming up to that intersection. And it will be a fairly wide intersection and a safer design would be one with a median. Obviously if there's a median there right now. 20 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: If! can jump in. Matt, there's no room for a median or ! mean ! understand it needs to be lined up with the road on the other side so we have to take out the median because it's aiming the wrong way but isn't there room to add a median back in? Saam: ! don't think that's the issue. ! think we could put one in there if there was a need for it. Sacchet: From your analysis there isn't a need? Saam: ...traffic numbers, there's some things that MnDot did take traffic counts at the intersection. Sacchet: So we're not totally without. Saam: ...20 year ADT's for the intersection that was requested by Commissioner Lillehaug. We have taken traffic counts at the existing intersection within the last 2 months so they know that the traffic that's going in there. They're not just saying oh, we don't need a signal. It's based on data. We're also having the traffic study reviewed to make sure A, do we not need a signal there? Is this going to work out? Everything like that so if the study comes back by the time of council and says you know, it would be a good idea to have a median, we'll put it in. ! don't think it's. Sacchet: So based on the information we have right now, it's not required. Saam: Exactly. Based on the people that we've had look at it, MnDot's traffic engineers, and they do have jurisdiction over this road right now. Even though West 78th Street will be turned back to the city, they have jurisdiction over it right now. Sacchet: Okay. Steve, ! didn't mean to interrupt. Lillehaug: No, that's fine. ! guess we do have traffic numbers for it now. ! don't know. Sacchet: We don't have the study yet. Lillehaug: No. ! think a median's important for proper channelization and that's the bottom line. ! don't think we should be taking a step backwards on this brand new road. You know no matter who's paying the bill. Even if it's part of my portion, I'm willing to pay it. It's going to be a busier intersection. ! see a flavor of this as a continuation of the frontage road out to Trunk Highway 5 and connecting up with this. The frontage road's not going to stop at 41. It's going to continue out in my mind and we need to do it right now. Again, ! don't want to seem shoe horned in here. If you go up and down that frontage road, ! mean ! can already see some of it's ripped up already, and it's 2 years old you know. Let me go on here. Sorry here. Sacchet: That's alright. Take yourtime. 21 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Lillehaug: The turn lanes on 41. We shouldn't deviate from the minimum required turn lane lengths that MnDot requires regardless if we don't think that traffic major route is going to be to the south and taking a right. It's a standard 300 foot left turn lane and that should be strictly adhered to. You've got 50 miles an hour out on 41 and that should be strictly enforced. Well, if this does go through ! think we need a fence on top of that wall. There's a wall further down on the frontage road in front of. Sacchet: Retaining wall you're talking about? Lillehaug: Retaining wall. What did I say? But right to the east of Kwik Trip, it's a significant right on that retaining wall and there is a fence on top of that retaining wall. Sacchet: Are you saying a guard rail or a fence? Lillehaug: A fence. Sacchet: Because it's next to the roadway. You could say it needs a guardrail, not a fence. Lillehaug: Which way does this wall go? Sacchet: The wall is on the south side. Lillehaug: Okay, I'm thinking of, I didn't look at that intersection out there in the field. I looked at the plans so the grades are going down. Dan Russ: The ground is higher than the roadway. Lillehaug: Guardrail, there we go. Definitely a guardrail. Thank you. What else here? You look at the frontage road again to the east. We've got trees up and down that frontage road. We have, ! realize there's existing trees out there but ! think we should have trees along that frontage road out there to continue the look of the frontage road. It's a continuation of it. Again, a few trees on the north there. They're showing 3. ! think there's some existing out there but ! think it's important that we maintain the standards of screening and berming on the north of that parking lot from Tanadoona and ! don't see why we would deviate here. Sacchet: Are we deviating? Lillehaug: Deviating from the standards as far as berming. Enough screening to screen the parking from Tanadoona. ! think we're deviating from the standards... Sacchet: Is it possible to berm? I mean what are the grades? Lillehaug: There's 65 feet there. There's plenty of room, in my mind. 22 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Keefe: ... for trees or vegetation. I mean there's grass out there. Sacchet: So there's room for planting and possibly berming. Is there room? Dan Russ: Well there certainly room to grade on Tanadoona and then...so half the parking lot, the berm is material. The other half it would be... ! would think you would want a lower landscape berm... Sacchet: Landscape berm. Dan Russ: Pine trees versus dirt that doesn't do much. Sacchet: Got it. Lillehaug: So in summary ! think this should be a temporary driveway connection all the way out to Trunk Highway 41 at this time. That's what ! support. Sacchet: Okay. Thanks for your comments Steve. Any other comments? Discussion? Slagle: I've got a few. Sacchet: Go ahead Rich. Slagle: If ! can ask another question of staff. Comment on Commissioner Lillehaug's last comment about the temporary call it street connecting to a temporary driveway. Why wouldn't we do that? Saam: In our mind now is the time to build it so we're going to have the developer go in there. The church put in curb and gutter, 26 feet wide and we're talking about what we're doing on the east side with ripping stuff out after a couple years. Now we're going to come back within probably 3 to 4 years and tear it out. Or at least along the edges and widen it. ! mean to us at least it's a good point that Commissioner Sacchet made. Build it up to where they're proposing their driveway and then we end it, and then when Carlson or whoever comes in in the future, then put the public street on. ! think that's a great point but ! just think we're missing an opportunity. It's a good use of funds now to do it. We don't have to do it as a public project. The church is willing to take on the lead. And then we just work out a payment agreement. There's some cost savings there. You don't have to go through public bidding, that sort of thing so we just think right now is a good time to do it with the driveway coming in. Sacchet: In terms of safety, ! mean is there a difference between the public or the temporary road? Saam: In terms of safety. Well if you talk about the intersection, as ! said we're going to make sure that is safe whether it's private or public, and ! believe the same improvements would have to be made. In terms of sight distance and that sort of thing. Lining up the 23 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 intersections. Whether we need the median or not. That will all have to be done now. Along the cost savings lines, just let me add, there's things like ponding. Setting up storm sewer. Wetland filling. The grading. ! just think it makes total sense to do this now with the private, with the driveway going in. Let's just make it a little wider. Get it done now. Build it up to their entrance and end it. Slagle: Okay. My comments are as follows. I think I support the project with some conditions added. And ! won't add those now. They'll be part of a motion but they center around the median, sidewalk, and the sidewalk would be the crossing of 41 and then the sidewalk issues in the parking lot. In response to Commissioner Lillehaug's concern of premature, I'm almost there Steve but I'm just short of agreeing so that's where ! stand right now. Sacchet: Okay. Bethany. Still no comments? Tjornhom: You're going to make me comment. You know ! understand the need for an expansion of the parking lot for safety. ! understand having a state patrolman out in the dark directing traffic in the rain and the snow and the hazards that that can cause. ! too would like to not take away any of the turn lanes, having deviations from the turn lanes on 41. And as far as a traffic study goes, in my mind we do a traffic study now for this section. If you expand for another building, do we do another traffic study for that then? Saam: We're having the traffic study take into account their ultimate development, along with possible ultimate Crimson Bay and Dogwood lots accessing off this road so. Tjornhom: So then they won't have to go back for, and wait for another traffic study. Saam: Hopefully not. Tjornhom: Okay. Now was there a traffic study done in the beginning? Saam: Yes. Tjornhom: And did that traffic study, was it adequate for what we're talking about now? Saam: No, not what we're talking about now. It didn't look at the exact configuration of the future, of these intersection improvements. Of the secondary access. It just basically stated that with additional expansion due to traffic, the Tanadoona intersection isn't going to work on it's own and that second one will have to be added. Tjornhom: That's too bad because we wouldn't probably be having this discussion had the first traffic study been adequate ! guess. But ! too generally support the project. You have to take the good with the bad and unfortunately, or ! mean fortunately or unfortunately ! think we have to take the parking lots. 24 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Keefe: I've got a couple comments. Give me a sense on the cost savings. We're going to, the city will be picking up what? The additional 5 feet, is that what my understanding is? Saam: Correct. Keefe: And then the cost of the intersection as well. Saam: No. No, the intersection as previously stated would be required. Those improvements, whether it's private or public so that's why we're reasoning that that portion needs to be paid by the church. So we have done the street costs, some minor pond increasing for the additional street width. The storm water that's generated by the additional widening of the street. That sort of thing. There's additional grading costs. Those type of things. Keefe: You know it seems like this is, at least right now obviously the benefit of the church and public safety, if indeed traffic will be split somewhat between the Tanadoona Drive and the West 78th Street. You know it's for a couple of hours on a Sunday. Boy, you know so the city's going to be picking up some costs associated with really what's going to benefit probably mostly the church and then people are going to be, there's going to be some people who are going to be driving down 41 at that particular time who hopefully it will be a safer situation because it's not stacking up as much on Tanadoona. Saam: Yeah, ! see where you're going but keep in mind, ! mean we as a city staff and planners, I'll include myself in that group, we all the time put in trunk or area wide type improvements that maybe aren't utilized to their maximum the minute they go in, but within 5 years they need to be there to further development along and ! think that's what we're doing here. We're setting ourselves up. It's in the comp plan... Keefe: Let me ask a second piece to it. What is the timing on the future church development? Do we have any plan in regards to that? Saam: I think Mr. Russ just said to me, within 6 months they're going to be adding another building. They'll be doing more. ! mean they have an ultimate plan that was looked at when this originally came in for what, 2-3 more buildings. More parking lots. A chapel out in the, so. You know multi phased development. At least probably 2-3 more improvement expansions. Keefe: 2 or 3 more over what? Any guess on timeframe? I mean you know, just what drive it is. Yeah okay, it's availability of funds. Okay. Dan Russ: ...if we had the funds today, we'd be in tomorrow and wanting to build a 4,500 seat sanctuary you know. Multi-purpose room, gathering room. Potentially a 300- 400 seat small chapel in the woods... 25 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Audience member: ! think the other thing to consider is the developments to the west of here. We're considering that more in the short term, in the next year or two versus a longer term so. You know again, we can bring something in now but on a temporary basis it's going to be really temporary for all the purposes that we're talking about. Keefe: It's probably outside of the scope of this meeting but what is the timing? 2 years? Audience member: Oh, as soon as we possibly can. We've got to get to agreement with the church on sewer connections and water. Sacchet: And you came in before, as ! remember, to look at some of that stuff so they've been here for a work session once to look at that stuff so it' s not something new. Keefe: Right, okay. The other thing I guess my other comment, what I would like to see more landscaping on the north end on Tanadoona. I don't know, I would agree with Dan's comment that I think that at least driving by, I think if you were to berm it, I don't know that you'd get a lot of benefit from that but I definitely think it would increase in the vegetation would help some on that particular piece. Sacchet: Thanks Dan. Steve, you want to add something? Lillehaug: Yeah, just a little more. ! don't think I'd be having such a big problem with this if the traffic study was done before everything was laid out. Traffic studies can be twisted once things are laid out and ! know they get twisted, regardless if it's an independent consultant firm, developer driven, staff driven. That should have been done before now in my mind, and that's the big problem because simple questions, ! mean the intersection is laid out and we don't have a clue and staff has indicated this to us. ! mean ! specifically asked, do we have any existing numbers or proposed numbers and they said there was none there. So how can you design an intersection without any traffic volumes, so that is my biggest problem right now is ! can't support this without, what are we approving? We're approving the unknown right here and that's the bottom line. Off site from the developer so I'm done. Sacchet: Alright. Is it my turn? My turn I guess. Well I wish traffic studies would have.., but unfortunately from our experience here, they're most the time more fluff than substance ! hate to say it but, in an ideal case it would have been nice to have it here but we don't have it so we have to live with that. Is it premature because of that? Or is it premature to make a public road? ! mean the worst that can happen is that it's going to need a light at that intersection. ! mean if that intersection's not going to function well, there's a very simple solution then. It's going to have to be signalized. ! don't personally think that the lack of the traffic study is a reason to hold this up. Yes, it would be highly preferable and desirable to have it in front of us. ! think it's mandatory that that will be in place for council, and that's already being assured that it will be in place for that. But ! would be prepared to let this go to council with making that point very, very clear and adding some of the other concerns and addressing them like one of them is definitely the median. And ! do agree with you Steve on that. The fact that currently we have a median 26 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 and we rip it out and we settle for something less. It doesn't sound quite right for me. Yes, it's an additional cost that is not attractive from that angle. But why should we go backward? Especially with an intersection that has some complexity to it with the turning movements and everything, in terms of safety. Does it absolutely need one? We're not the specialists on this but from what I'm seeing here, ! think it would be a good thing to have. Whether we want to make it a firm condition or not, ! don't know. ! could go either way on that. It's certainly something that we would want to have looked at very carefully further. Especially before it goes to council. The concern about this becoming a frontage road, and we have at least one neighbor here that spoke up about that. ! mean we had very vehement comments last time anything in this context came up that these people, they love their narrow, little road there, Dogwood. The reality is probably that there will be some changes. ! mean it's going to be developed, that property west of the church. It's going to have to be accessed and ! wonder where it ultimately is going to be. ! would expect it's actually going to be to the benefit of that neighborhood to have another access. And it's not going to become a through road. Even if it connects to Crimson Bay, which it may never but ! mean that goes through so many turns getting out onto 5, ! would not consider that a frontage road in the sense of frontage road. ! really would think it's going to remain an access road for the residents. Maybe with the addition that the church goers are going to start going that way west rather than come out on 41, but that's speculation. We don't need to delay for that excessively at this point. Should the road follow the standards? ! would very much recommend that, but that's out of our hands. ! mean that's a MnDot question and if they're willing to negotiate, they're willing to negotiate. That's not in our scope but only ! think it's important that those standards be adhered to. Should it be a temporary road all the way to 417 ! really disagree. Very fundamentally disagree. ! think this is the time to make this a public road. This is the time to make this the full width. It goes across a wetland. There is this grading involved and there's a lot involved. Be silly to make it more narrow and then have to add it on. That does not compute and make it too where the driveway is because we don't need to go further at this point and there's no need for the city to bear the cost to go further to go nowhere. Do we need a guardrail above that retaining wall? ! think that's mandatory. ! think we have an agreement on that. The trees. I'm kind of a tree guy here on this little group, and it kind of irks me that there was no quantification of the trees that are being cut so if maybe that can be looked at a little bit before it goes to council, ! think that would make sense. To make sure there is a decent buffer of the parking lot to the north to where it's going to do, and ! think that's a very reasonable requirement to put in there in terms of integrating this as well as possible into the existing neighborhood. Sidewalks ! think are very important. And ! think that it was very well received by the developer to have something that goes across the islands. Kind of up in... and at the same time adding a sidewalk all the way to the end of the parking lot so that people in a safe way can easily get to church, the service. They can push their strollers, what have you. Made sense and it looks like it received like that. The other aspect of traffic is the crossing of 41. ! don't know what to do about that. ! mean can we make, do we do striping so pedestrians go across? ! mean is there a solution? 27 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Saam: Yes. I mean striping, signage, maybe even a push button thing. I doubt we'd get that but. Sacchet: Well once we get a light but we have no light at this point. Saam: Yeah. That's about all we can hope for at this point. Striping and signage. As Commissioner Slagle mentioned, as we have on Powers. Sacchet: Well, that's all my comments. Sorry for being a little lengthy. And ! would like to have a motion, if somebody would want to venture a motion. Slagle: I'll make a motion. Sacchet: Go ahead Rich. Slagle: Hold on one second. Sacchet: You know, while you're still scribbling. I'm actually glad this came through. ! mean it's an important comment to make. When this came in front of us at first, at least some of us up here actually spoke up and said how's this going to work with just the Tanadoona access, and everyone was talking about how this is going to be improved and it's going to be at a 90 degree angle and it is going to be all these wonderful things, but ! haven't driven past it too many times when there was traffic but it's a real issue. ! think it really, really needs that second access. It needs it where there's a major intersection type thing and ! really welcome and want to commend you for bringing this in. Maybe a little before it absolutely is necessary. Totally necessary. ! think it's necessary now and it's a good thing to do so ! want to commend you for doing that. Are you ready Rich? Slagle: I'm jotting down some conditions but I'm sure there will be a few more. I recommend that the Planning Commission approve Planning Case number 04-20 Site Plan Review for a 143 space parking lot expansion, extension of temporary drive and extension of West 78th Street, , plans prepared by Pioneer Engineering, dated May 14, 2004, subject to the following conditions. And ! will right now we're at 34. And I'm going to add a few and, well actually do ! add them now? ! do don't I? Sacchet: Yes, you can add them with your motion. Slagle: My number 35 is a guardrail to be placed on top of the retaining wall on the southern end of the property. Number 36. The raised median on the east side of 41, placed on West 78th currently to be removed and a new one placed in correct alignment with the extension westward of West 78th. 37 would be a sidewalk to be extended along the main driveway from the main entrance of the church on the east side of the main driveway and I'll ask staff to help with the verbiage. But basically running to the northern end of the driveway where the new parking lot ends. And then there would be two diagonal walkways similar to the northwest parking lot, on that northern, across the alleys or island if you will. And that's what ! have so far so if anybody wants. 28 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: We have a motion. Is there a second? Lillehaug: Point of clarification. This, ! think what the applicant told me is wrong. The road is lower than the boulevard in this area. Sacchet: That's what they're saying, yes. Lillehaug: Then we don't need a guardrail. Slagle: Yeah, then we don't need a guardrail. Lillehaug: You don't need a guardrail. You need a fence above the retaining wall. Dan Russ: Correct. Correct. Sacchet: Now you confused me. We have the road and then the drop? Slagle: No. Sacchet: Oh, you have the road and then go up? Dan Russ: Yes. Sacchet: So then you don't need a guardrail. Slagle: No. Okay, no guardrail. Fence. Sacchet: Fence on top of the. Lillehaug: Fence on top of the wall. Keefe: If you have a retaining wall, why do you need a fence? Lillehaug: You don't want anyone... Maybe the Arboretum has a chain link fence out there already. Can staff comment on that? Saam: They do have a fence. Sacchet: If there's not people out there, they don't need a fence. Lillehaug: Right. So if there's no people up there, the Arboretum already has a fence, then we're probably okay with it ! guess. Slagle: Okay, I'll take it off. 29 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: Good point. Thanks for clarifying that. ! thought it was dropping, not raising. Slagle: Then number 35 is off, okay. Sacchet: Alright. We have a motion. Is there a second? Tjornhom: Second. Sacchet: We have a second. Are there friendly amendments? More. Saam: Mr. Chair? Sacchet: Yes. Saam: Did you add, just saw on my notes, buffering along Tanadoona. Did ! hear that? Sacchet: Not yet. Do you want to add that? Keefe: Yeah, ! would like to add. Sacchet: So that would be, since we skipped 35. Slagle: So it would be 37. Sacchet: 37 would be the berming, or the buffering. Landscape buffer. Slagle: Additional landscaping on northern side. Sacchet: On the north side towards Tanadoona. That's this one, okay. We did the median. We can't really require anything to cross 41. That's beyond this project, is it? Slagle: No, we can request. Saam: With the intersection improvements you can. Sacchet: Yeah, because ! think we should do something. If we can only do striping, let's do striping. Did ! actually mention that? Slagle: Require striping and signage, is that okay Matt? Saam: Yes. Sacchet: Striping, yeah it needs signs otherwise it's useless. Saam: For crosswalk. 30 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: For crosswalk, yes. That's important. So that would be 38. Keefe: How about entrance signage? I notice on the plan they've got, are planning on putting in an entrance sign. Do we require anything to be consistent with their other one? Or to be consistent with, is there anything we would amend or do we kind of just let them. Do they have to come back for approval on that anyway? Sacchet: Well signage needs a permit. So they have to come back with their sign so we can let that be at this point. Did we discuss temporary road? Well the conditions require the public road all the way to where the temporary road, driveway comes in. How about, ! remember we had some situation in the past where we made a stipulation that should a light be required, a signalized intersection, that there would be some sharing of costs or something to that effect. ! don't know how we worded it in the past. ! don't know whether we need to go as far as having an escrow or how we would handle that. Saam: Yeah, we've gotten letter of credit or financial security. ! think we mentioned financial security will be required to guarantee installation of public improvements. might offer up that when we get the traffic study by the time of council, if we find we do need a signal at that time we could require it. Sacchet: ! think it was Lake Street. Somewhere in the Village of the Ponds we had a situation where we put something in like at Lake Drive, yeah. Saam: Pulte too across the street. We had them escrow funds but again there we had a development contract and everything and at that time we did believe there was going to need to be a signal there. This is before West 78th Street. Sacchet: So we don't need to make that condition, but we can make it comments for council to consider. Keefe: Do we put an amendment in on, for a condition in regards to the traffic study. Do we need to add something along... Sacchet: The traffic, we can make that a comment too. That the traffic study needs to be ready to do to council, and then the same with the light. We can make that comments rather than conditions because it's not something that's probably going to be conditional yet. Okay? Slagle: I don't think I can offer conditions at this point. Right? Is that correct? Sacchet: Yes you can. You can amend. Slagle: If! made the motion? Sacchet: You can friendly amend yourself. 31 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Slagle: Okay, friendly amend myself. Sacchet: But you also have to accept them. Slagle: Yeah. That'd be interesting if you offer one and don't accept it. But ! want to have something about the public safety officer. And again I'm thinking for some time frame, and again I'd leave that up to the applicant and staff to work out but ! don't think we can just start and then see what happens, and ! know the applicant is, so I'm going to put condition number 39. Require public safety officer to continue working both Tanadoona and West 78th for 8 weeks. 4 weeks? Sacchet: ! wouldn't quantify it Rich. Slagle: Okay. Sacchet: ! would trust the operation, but that to state that they have to continue. ! think that' s fair. Slagle: Continue, okay. Keefe: Just continue for a period of time until they deem it's not necessary. Sacchet: ! mean if that's a concern ofyour's... Slagle: It is. It is. Dan Russ: ! would just kind of restate it that public safety. They're the ones that are on top of what needs to happen. We don't know if it's safe or not. We need public safety to tell us, we don't need somebody here or we need somebody here at this time and that time. Slagle: Does that go through you Matt? Saam: ! can sure coordinate it. We can work with them because we do the traffic counts and what not so ! would. Slagle: Okay, so require public safety officer to continue working intersections as directed by public safety. Okay. Perfect. Because there was no reference to it in here. Sacchet: Okay. Did you accept that amendment? Slagle: ! accept that. Sacchet: Alright. We have a motion. We have a second. We have friendly amendments. 32 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Slagle moved, Tjornhom seconded that the Planning Commission recommends approval of Planning Case 04-20 Site Plan Review for a 143-space parking lot expansion, extension of temporary drive and extension of West 78th Street, plans prepared by Pioneer Engineering, dated May 14, 2004, subject to the following conditions: The applicant shall enter into a site plan agreement with the City and provide the necessary security to guarantee erosion control, site restoration and landscaping. Tree preservation fencing shall be installed around all existing landscaping at the edge of grading limits. Any existing landscaping that is removed must be replaced when the parking lot construction is completed. 4. The landscape islands shall be filled with wood chips. 5. Overstory trees are required along West 78th St.; one every 30 feet. Three accessible parking spaces must be added to the existing accessible parking area. Wetland replacement shall occur in a manner consistent with the Minnesota Wetland Conservation Act (MR 8420). The applicant shall receive the City's approval of a wetland replacement plan prior to any wetland impact occurring. A wetland buffer 0 to 20 feet in width (with a minimum average of 10 feet) shall be maintained around all existing and proposed wetlands (wetland buffers proposed for PVC must maintain a width of 16.5 feet). Wetland buffer areas shall be preserved, surveyed and staked in accordance with the City' s wetland ordinance. The applicant shall install wetland buffer edge signs, under the direction of City staff, before construction begins and will pay the City $20 per sign. 9. All structures shall maintain a 40-foot setback from the edge of the wetland buffer. 10. The proposed development shall maintain existing runoff rates. Storm water calculations shall be submitted to staff to ensure runoff rates will not increase as a result of the proposed development. The applicant may work with the Arboretum to ensure their concerns are addressed. 11. Drainage and utility easements shall be provided over all existing wetlands, wetland mitigation areas, buffer areas used for mitigation credit and storm water ponds. 12. Erosion control blanket shall be installed on all slopes greater than or equal to 3:1. All exposed soil areas shall have temporary erosion protection or permanent cover year round, according to the following table of slopes and time frames: 33 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Type of Slope Time Steeper than 3:1 7 days 10:1 to 3:1 14 days Flatter than 10:1 21 days (Maximum time an area can remain open when the area is not actively being worked.) These areas include constructed storm water management pond side slopes, and any exposed soil areas with a positive slope to a storm water conveyance system, such as a curb and gutter system, storm sewer inlet, temporary or permanent drainage ditch or other natural or man made systems that discharge to a surface water. 13. Street cleaning of soil tracked onto public streets shall include daily street scraping and street sweeping as-needed. 14. The applicant shall apply for and obtain permits from the appropriate regulatory agencies, e.g. Minnehaha Creek Watershed District, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (for dewatering) and Army Corps of Engineers and comply with their conditions of approval. 15. All final plans must be signed by a registered civil engineer. 16. Use the latest version (2004) of the City's Standard Detail Plates. 17. The twin storm sewer culverts under West 78th Street must be RCP Class 5. 18. The existing driveway from Highway 41 to the existing homes in the northwest corner of the West 78th Street intersection must be removed and seeded or sodded. 19. Include concrete driveway aprons and pedestrian ramps for both proposed driveways off of new West 78th Street. 20. The new painted median for the eastbound West 78th Street traffic on the east side of Highway 41 must be a raised concrete median with pedestrian ramps. 21. Install a temporary turnaround with barricades and a sign stating "This street to be extended" at the west end of new West 78th Street. 22. Provide a pedestrian ramp at the northeast corner of the new West 78th Street/Highway 41 intersection for connection to the future city trail. 23. Incorporate the conditions of the MnDOT review letter dated June 1, 2004 into the plans. 34 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 24. Show all of the proposed grades for the new driveway to the existing home in the southeast corner of the site. 25. A permit for the proposed retaining wall is required to be obtained from the Building Department and the wall must be designed by a registered structural engineer. 26. Off-site grading will require a temporary easement or right-of-entry agreement from the Arboretum. 27. Should earthwork quantities not balance on site and materials need to be imported or exported from the site, the developer will need to supply the City with a detailed haul route for review and approval by staff. In addition, if material is proposed to be exported to another location in Chanhassen, it should be noted that the properties would be required to obtain an earthwork permit from the City. 28. All areas disturbed as a result of construction-related activity must be sodded and/or seeded and disc mulched within two weeks of disturbance. 29. A MnDOT drainage permit will be required. In addition, an NPDES permit and Watershed district permit will be required for the project grading. 30. Drainage and utility easements will be required over the wetland, pond, and the adjacent mitigation areas. An easement for access purposes will also be required for future maintenance of the wetlands. 31. Erosion control measures and site restoration must be developed in accordance with the City's Best Management Practice Handbook (BMPH). Staff recommends that the City's Type I! silt fence, which is a heavy duty fence, be used adjacent to all existing wetlands and ponds. In addition, erosion control blankets should be used on all slopes 3:1 or greater with heights of 6' or more. 32. A financial security will be required to guarantee installation of the public improvements. 33. Bituminous curb and gutter must be added to the temporary driveway. 34. Prior to any future building expansion to the west side of the existing church building, the temporary access driveway from West 78th Street must be brought up to current standards in effect at the time." 35. The raised median on the east side of 41, placed on West 78th currently to be removed and a new one placed in correct alignment with the extension westward of West 78th. 35 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 36. A sidewalk be extended along the main driveway from the main entrance of the church on the east side to the northern end of the driveway where the new parking lot ends and two diagonal walkways similar to the northwest parking lot. 37. Additional landscaping along the north side on Tanadoona Drive. 38. Require public safety officer to continue working the two intersections as directed by public safety. All voted in favor, except Lillehaug who opposed, and the motion carried with a vote of 4 to 1. Sacchet: Steve, do you want to add, we already heard why you're opposing. Do you want to add summary wise in the vote? Lillehaug: Sure, and the council people want to see a summary because they don't, they requested that so in a quick summary. ! think this is premature without the traffic study being completed. ! don't think we should deviate backwards from not re-installing concrete median. Slagle: We are going to do that. Sacchet: We asked that to happen. Lillehaug: Good. ! must have been asleep. Sacchet: We did listen to you some. Lillehaug: Well then I'm happy. No, no, no. ! still feel it's premature. Sacchet: So that would not have changed your vote? Lillehaug: No. Sacchet: And you made that very clear in your comments so. Lillehaug: Even with median we need a traffic study. We just need it. Sacchet: Okay. Well let me summarize for council a little bit and you guys help me out. We all, ! believe in some degrees welcome this secondary access. Slagle: Want to do this one first? Sacchet: Oh no, we do, well yeah. Let's do the second motion. 36 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Slagle: ! would make a motion that we approve planning case 04-20 Wetland Alteration Permit to alter and fill wetlands on site, plans prepared by Pioneer Engineering dated May 14, 2004 subject to the following conditions, 1 through 9. Sacchet: We have a motion. Is there a second? Keefe: Second. Sacchet: Any comments? Additions? Friendly amendments? No? Slagle moved, Keefe seconded that the Planning Commission recommends approval of Planning Case 04-20 Wetland Alteration Permit to alter and fill wetlands on site, plans prepared by Pioneer Engineering, dated May 14, 2004, subject to the following conditions: The applicant shall develop an amendment to the wetland replacement plan to achieve the required 2:1 replacement without employing credits constructed during the first phase. Wetland replacement shall occur in a manner consistent with the Minnesota Wetland Conservation Act (MR 8420). The applicant shall receive the City's approval of a wetland replacement plan prior to any wetland impact occurring. The applicant shall provide proof of recording of a Declaration of Restrictions and Covenants for Replacement Wetland. A wetland buffer 0 to 20 feet in width (with a minimum average of 10 feet) shall be maintained around all existing and proposed wetlands. (Wetland buffers proposed for PVC must maintain a width of 16.5 feet.) Wetland buffer areas shall be preserved, surveyed and staked in accordance with the City' s wetland ordinance. The applicant shall install wetland buffer edge signs, under the direction of City staff, before construction begins and will pay the City $20 per sign. 4. All structures shall maintain a 40-foot setback from the edge of the wetland buffer. The proposed development shall maintain existing runoff rates. Storm water calculations shall be submitted to staff to ensure runoff rates will not increase as a result of the proposed development. The applicant may work with the Arboretum to ensure their concerns are addressed. Drainage and utility easements shall be provided over all existing wetlands, wetland mitigation areas, buffer areas used for mitigation credit and storm water ponds. Erosion control blanket shall be installed on all slopes greater than or equal to 3:1. All exposed soil areas shall have temporary erosion protection or permanent cover year round, according to the following table of slopes and time frames: 37 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Type of Slope Time Steeper than 3:1 7 days 10:1 to 3:1 14 days Flatter than 10:1 21 days (Maximum time an area can remain open when the area is not actively being worked.) These areas include constructed storm water management pond side slopes, and any exposed soil areas with a positive slope to a storm water conveyance system, such as a curb and gutter system, storm sewer inlet, temporary or permanent drainage ditch or other natural or man made systems that discharge to a surface water. Street cleaning of soil tracked onto public streets shall include daily street scraping and street sweeping as-needed. The applicant shall apply for and obtain permits from the appropriate regulatory agencies, e.g. Minnehaha Creek Watershed District, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (for dewatering) and Army Corps of Engineers and comply with their conditions of approval." All voted in favor, except Lillehaug who opposed, and the motion carried with a vote of 4 to 1. Sacchet: It's still 4 to 1 as before. ! assume for the same reasons. And summary for council. ! believe we all welcome in some form the additional access capability there as it is accessing the church as well as the somewhat landlocked land on the west side there, which was brought in front of us before as a concern. We have concerns about the traffic study not having been completed. We definitely would like to see that completed before it goes to council. ! think that's a requirement. We also have an issue about, what was the other one we wanted the council? Whether it needs a light. That's it, the light. That it needs to be looked at and it's connected to the traffic study. That there seems to be high probability that at some point this intersection will have to signalized. And that we wondered whether there might be stipulation in this that the applicant would have to help bear some of the costs of a traffic light. We've had cases like that before where we put in stipulations like that with developments, developers should that arise. ! don't know whether we would go as far as putting... Want to add something Rich? Slagle: Directly on that subject, and ! would just ask that the council, if that is discussed, that it be in the broad sense of applicants plural. Future applicants. That that is shared with all due respect. Sacchet: It would have to be in the context between the different applicants definitely so. There is the recurring comment that comes from the neighborhood to the west along the lake that they really don't want more roads going in there, which is somewhat in conflict with the comprehensive plan that was envisioning West 78th somewhat connecting into that area. We don't think that this will ever become a really major frontage road. We believe it's going to stay just a neighborhood access either way. We do think it's 38 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 important for all the road alterations on 41 to follow the full standards of road construction from MnDot and so forth with the turning lanes and everything. We looked at safety and we had some concerns about crossing 41. We want to make sure there's sufficient sidewalks on either side accessing the new parking lot area. ! think that was very well received with crosswalks across the islands and then walkway all the way to the end of the parking lot. Additional landscape buffering towards Tanadoona to integrate it more, and also a tree study was kind of absent from this in terms of what are we cutting down. ! would think that'd be an element that could be addressed to some extent when it goes in front of council. ! would encourage that. And ! think that's about the comments. Anything else? Lillehaug: ! had one rebuttal comment is, my opinion is that it will have a flavor of a frontage road once this is connected with Crimson Bay. Sacchet: Okay. If it gets connected. If. Lillehaug: If, there we go. Yep. Sacchet: Alright. And ! think that's it for this one. Thank you very much. Wish you luck with this project. Thanks for cooperating and everything. PUBLIC HEARING: REQUEST FOR SITE PLAN APPROVAL FOR A 13,000 SQUARE FOOT COMMERCIAL BUILDING WITH REOUESTS FOR PARKING AND SIGN VARIANCES ON 1.9 ACRES ZONED PLANNED UNIT DEVELOPMENT LOCATED AT THE NORTHEAST CORNER OF HIGHWAY 5 AND GALPIN BOULEVARD, BEAR CREEK CAPITAL, LLC AND CHANHASSEN DEVELOPMENT, LLC, CVS/PHARMACY, PLANNING CASE NO. 04-21. Bob Generous presented the staff report on this item. Sacchet: Thanks Bob. Questions from staff. Tjornhom: My question is regarding, and ! don't know if ! missed it in my reading because ! could have missed it but the drive thru stipulation. Was there a whole part that showed the hours and you know noise, speakers, lighting, that kind of thing or wasn't there? Generous: There wasn't as part of the staff report, no. Tjornhom: Okay. And I mean, is that something we should talk about or is it okay? Generous: Well if it's a concern of your' s, we can definitely request the applicant clarify what their hours of operation are. Tjornhom: We don't have any rules though about hours or anything like that? 39 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Generous: No, not specifically. Only if they create excessive noise and it becomes a nuisance. Tjornhom: And it's a pharmacy so I was just assuming since it is a pharmacy it might be open a little later. Which isn't a big deal I'm sure but I'm just, and so then with lighting for that too, there's no problem with it being lit? Generous: Well it's all down lit as required by our ordinance so there's very little spill over. Tjornhom: Okay. That's all for now I think. Sacchet: Thanks Bethany. Keefe: I've got a couple questions. The amount of parking on the site, is that driven by the need from the retail piece or is it more, what is driving the amount of parking ! guess is the question. Generous: Well our ordinance requires specific amounts. Retail operations are 1 per 200 square feet of building area. They're exceeding that slightly. What our ordinance would require. Keefe: Okay. So is that ordinance also take into account the drive thru for this type of use? ! mean you know, the question ! would have is there a reduction required for parking in association with having a drive thru? Generous: No. Keefe: No? Okay. The drive thru itself, how you get to the drive thru. It looks like you enter it from the northwest corner and you go through the parking lot and you wrap around the building and come to the drive thru. Is there also a second entrance to the northeast? And that's what it looks like? But it looks like out on the plan, at least ! was looking at it, there was a sign that says drive thru through the parking lot. ! didn't know what, sort of the natural flow for the drive thru is. Would it typically go through the parking lot or would it typically go, come in to the second entrance? Generous: The applicant may be able to discuss the operation. Sacchet: It might be an applicant. Generous: If there's no cars there coming from the northeast into that drop off, would be a very natural movement. Saam: ! think the major access point though typically is from Galpin. At least that's where we see most of the traffic currently. That accesses that Kwik Trip so if you're 40 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 coming from there, chances are you're probably going to make the first right and make the loop around versus going down. Keefe: Yeah, I mean just during all operations, if you have cars backing in and out, I mean it is a convenience store type of retail use where you're going to have cars backing in and out and then you're going to have people going through the drive thru. It seems like you would want to route them maybe separately if you have the option to do that, and it looks like you have a second entrance a little further east. I'm just kind of curious what your thoughts are on that. The berming and the landscaping along 5, what is the height of the berm? The one thought ! had is when ! looked at this and ! thought of the count for the landscaping and shrubs and it says well we're going to over shrub. You know a lot of low level. Well this is the type of low level, I'm not sure what type of cover you're going to get. Saam: Yeah, that's one of the, one of our conditions ! believe in there. They're showing existing, what looks like existing topography or contours on the Highway 5 side, but in reality it's our belief, those contours are what this site was like prior to the development coming in there. So ! think that's one of our conditions in there that we've added is to give us true existing topo and then show us the berming you know at that point because they're not showing any proposed berming along 5 currently. Keefe: Okay. It says berming and landscape on. Saam: On the site plan. If you look on the grading, none of the proposed contours are being shown there. And it makes us think that there is this big existing berm there and there's an existing berm right where the building is. If you go out to the site, it's been as a separate, it says it's been rough graded. So we believe these contours were from prior to the rough grading occurring, if you follow me. Keefe: Yeah, okay. Question on the sign. Is the sign we're talking about the one on this elevation? That they're proposing, or are we talking about the other one that's sort of out next door to the, across the street with the Kwik Trip? Generous: No, the one that's outside of the parking lot. Keefe: Okay, so this one would remain. Generous: Yes, and they comply with the ordinance. Keefe: Okay, so this one complies but we're talking about a free standing sign that is the one that is not recommended, is that correct? Generous: That's correct. Keefe: Okay. 41 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Generous: That's it? Steve, you want to jump in? Lillehaug: Sure. Parking setbacks. Why in staff's opinion would we deviate from the parking setbacks? ! mean why do we typically maintain parking setbacks? And then why would we deviate from them in this case? Generous: Why we maintain them? You want to separate them from the highway. We reduce the amount of parking in the front of this building. Those setbacks would work perfectly if the building backed up to this Highway 5. And that's what our previous design actually it was the side of the building that we were looking at with the original project. And they only needed one row of parking there and then the drive aisle to get around the building. Now, when they came in we said put your front up on Highway 5. When you have a retail operation you put your parking in the front because people aren't going to park in back and walk around the building so we're recommending approval so that this operation will work for the developer. Can we get screening on the parking lot? Definitely. There's sufficient land in there. Parking. Use of hedges works. We don't have to accept these small, they're definitely, definitely they're picture wants to show their building. That's why they provide that. But they will grow. Lillehaug: So you're saying if you were to back of the building, ! mean you kind of back the building, ! mean if there would have been a different arrangement where the building was flipped around, you're saying we wouldn't have had a parking setback problem? Generous: Highway 5, no. They would have met, we believe they would have been able to meet that. Lillehaug: Even with the drive thru having to circulate? Generous: Because the drive thru could come up. Or the driveway can come up to this line so they could bring the driveway around here. Put one row of parking on top of that. Next to the end of the building and face all the fronts of the unit out to here. We're actually looking at possibly a multi-tenant building. And so they'd have the frontage onto Galpin. But with a single user we said put your frontage on Highway 5. By doing that that leads to the rest of the site there. Lillehaug: Okay. Let's see, what else here. The entrances. ! posed these questions to your earlier but ! want to throw them out there. The northeast entrance is pretty close to Galpin Boulevard and there could be operational problems. Keefe: Northwest. Lillehaug: Northwest, sorry. If 3 cars came in there trying to turn into the parking lot at once and they started backing up onto Galpin Boulevard, do we have any concerns with that or are we pretty, we think this is the best situation we've got here? And also both driveways, is it possible to line them up with the Kwik Trip driveways? 42 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Saam: ! believe yes, you could in both of them. However, especially this northwest one. With the layout that they've shown, if you think about it. When you come in then and make that right turn, it would almost be a 180 degree turn to get back into that main drive aisle. ! mean could it be done? Yeah. It could. ! guess that's something you have to weigh against that turning movement and. This one to us just seemed to lay out a little better, but ! do agree with your comment with the access being close to Galpin. It's kind of a two edge sword. Lillehaug: Are they widening this shared road inbetween Kwik Trip? Is that being widened? Am ! seeing that right? Because ! comment on that, why ! ask is. Saam: The private street? Lillehaug: Yeah, inbetween there. Is it being widened at all? And it goes with access because ! drive in there and it is a little narrower when you're coming off Galpin, if we have that entrance right off Galpin. Saam: They're not proposing. We could check with the applicant but ! don't think they're proposing to widen it. Lillehaug: No? Okay. Well, let me go on here and just, someone else can go here. think I've got everything. Sacchet: Okay. Well we can get back to you Steve if you have some more thoughts. Go ahead Rich. Slagle: I've just got a basic question for staff on this, and the question would be, given the size that this applicant is requesting for this building, do you believe it is too large for this lot? Generous: No. Slagle: Okay. My next question with that answer, is this. Is this traffic flow that we're talking about, which ! think is a result of requesting two rows of parking on the front, and ! go back to staff's recommendation that the front be towards 5. Okay. ! think that, my question is do you feel that we are going to run into some real traffic issues in that northwest entrance/the private road to Galpin? I'll give you an example. If the drive thru was on the east side of the building, okay? They would drive through. You would have one lane of parking on the front. They would pick up their thing on the east side and drive north. And then they would go out that entrance either to the east to West 78th or they'd take a left there and come back to Galpin versus, because really what we've resulted is we have two sides of the store that have no parking. And ! don't know if that's a result of us requesting the front be towards 5 or if the sides of the building and their desire not to have a drive thru on the east and I'm not an expert but ! just think we're going to have a really interesting entrance/exit right at Galpin and especially with 43 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 the Kwik Trip traffic so, that's comments but my question is, do you think we are, do you think this is the only alternative? Saam: No, I don't. I mean you just threw one out. Commissioner Lillehaug threw it out moving the entrances. Slagle: Was it discussed with the applicant any other options? Generous: Well only initially we did recommend that they flip the building and put it in that corner. The northeast. We thought east/northeast and they went north/northeast. For where the drive thru window is. Slagle: Oh okay. That's all. Sacchet: Steve, did you find any more? ! have a few questions too. And my main concern here is not so much the parking. ! think that's a given that you want the parking close to where the entrance is. And it makes sense to have your entrance in that corner to the southwest. However with the drive thru, ! mean ! see people are not going to drive around the building. People are going to drive into the easterly entrance and to make a U turn to go up to the drive thru from there because that's the shorter way to do it. Slagle: Or a hard right. Sacchet: Yeah, that's what ! mean. It's like a U turn almost. Like right. Slagle: You're from Europe, so it would be a U turn. Sacchet: For you it'd be a hard right, alright. Thanks for the language lesson. So with that making a hard right, if there is nobody stacked up, then that should go pretty smooth. Trouble is if there are cars stacked up, then it becomes an issue. It gets a little messy because if somebody's been waiting in line there for a while wrapping around the building and somebody comes and makes the hard right, but maybe that's something the applicant can tell us. ! don't know whether this type of thing, people stack up. Maybe they stack up very little and it's not an issue. So that's not a staff question. You'll have to help me with that one. We're clear on EFIS. We're clear on the windows. Are we clear with the buffer yards? ! mean we said buffer yard plantings are not where they need to be and we asked them to fulfill the minimum requirement. There's no issue there? There's plenty of room to put all that stuff?. And one thing that kind of irked me from a procedural thing, the staff report, the body of the staff report doesn't have findings and there are two variances here. One is the variance of the parking setback and the other one is the variance for the sign variance. There seems to be some sort of findings later on here and then the findings of fact part following the staff report. ! just want to be clear whether they take the place of the findings that we usually see in the staff report. Generous: Right. These are instead of duplicating them. We copy the findings that we have in the staff report and put them in the findings. 44 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: So moving forward we'll do it this way so we don't have to look at them twice to see whether they were edited in the meantime in one place and not in the other. Generous: Yes, exactly. If you change them up front, we want them to be consistent. Sacchet: Okay. And so I'm clear on that one. Detail question. Norway Maple. We seem to make a condition that we do not want different, Norway Maple. It seems very specific thing and ! was just curious. That's not a recommended tree in Chanhassen? Generous: That was Jill's comment. Sacchet: Alright. Well that's all my questions. Thank you. With that, ! do believe we have an applicant here. If you want to come forward and tell us more about your project. If you have anything to add to what staff had and maybe we have some questions. Maybe you see some of the questions that came up already and the questions of staff, if you want to state your name and address for the record please. Bill Tippmann: My name is Bill Tippmann. I'm Vice President of Bear Creek Capital. We are a development real estate development company from Cincinnati, Ohio. We are 1 of 7 developers designated by CVS to develop and construct their stores in the United States. We've been assigned, we've been a developer for CVS in the Cincinnati, Dayton market for about 6 years. We've been working here in the Twin Cities area for about 2 years. We currently are in various stages of development on approximately 20 sites in, we've been assigned this side of the river. There's another developer similar to us who's doing the other side of the river. In fact today was a big day. We closed on our first site after 2 years of hard work in the city of Plymouth. Sacchet: Congratulations. Bill Tippmann: Thank you. I also have Mark Jasper with Anderson Engineering with us who can answer any technical questions. With respect to the drive thru, ! know there was a lot of discussion and circulation around the drive thru. The city, of the 20 sites that we're doing, ! believe there are 5 or 6 inside the city of Minneapolis. The transportation, Director of Transportation in the City of Minneapolis had the very same question. We commissioned a study to satisfy his concerns. We'll be more than happy to share with staff but the short story on that study was that they observed, and ! believe first of all CVS functions very much like a Walgreen's in this market. They both have the double drive thru pick-up window that I'll describe in a second. But they observed ! believe 5 Walgreen's in the Minneapolis area and 4 or 5 CVS stores in the Chicago area and in each case they logged the number of cars waiting at a pick up window at all the observed stores. The most they saw waiting at any one store at any one time was 3 cars, so with that the City of Minneapolis is requiring that we have, that we provide stacking of at least 3 cars back of here. So that being the case, ! don't know, ! personally don't believe there' s going to be much of a conflict between people entering the cue for that drive thru. 45 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: Well that helps because one of your drawings shows 12 of them waiting. Bill Tippmann: Why 12, whether somebody got happy with the mouse ! don't know. Sacchet: Somebody was definitely...cars. Bill Tippmann: So again, if anyone's interested in that study, more than willing to share. As to the function of the drive thru. The way they operate is exactly the same Walgreen's, so you may be familiar within this market. They have an outside drop off window where you actually it's a pneumatic tube where you drop off the paper prescription. You come back around when the prescription is filled at the window. Is that me? Sacchet: That was me, sorry. Bill Tippmann: And the point I'm stressing here is that of the merchandise that's in the store, the only products he can pick up at the window are pharmaceuticals. You can't buy a gallon of milk. You can't buy Pampers. You can only get pharmaceuticals there. Slagle: If ! may, just so I'm clear. Did you just state that they would drive through the pattern that we see here on our plans and on some cylinder like a bank, they would drop in a prescription. Bill Tippmann: If you were to look at the elevations of the building there's a sign over. Slagle: Can you show us? There we go. Bill Tippmann: There's a sign over. Slagle: And what I'm getting at is, are you suggesting that someone goes around twice? Bill Tippmann: They could either call in their prescription and pick it up when it's ready, or if they have a paper prescription they could drop it off on the outside. This lane being the outside lane. Slagle: And that's the east elevation? Bill Tippmann: Yeah. And make it out...where it says drop off or prescription drop off or something like that. And you drop it off in a pneumatic tube. Slagle: And that's the one that's on the lane to the north of the lane that you pick up. Bill Tippmann: Correct. Slagle: Okay. 46 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Bill Tippmann: And to pick up your pharmaceuticals. Slagle: You drive again around and get closer to the building. Okay. Bill Tippmann: Any more questions I can answer. Slagle: Boy yeah. ! mean you've even, with that description of potentially, and ! think more than likely a double circle around the building, I'm even wondering more what your thoughts are as to having your drive thru on the east side of the building. Bill Tippmann: I heard that discussion and I guess I didn't understand what the benefit was. Slagle: Sure. Let me try and give you at least one person's viewpoint. Two, and interesting we both live north of this property as the crow flies less than a mile, so we use that Kwik Trip quite often. Galpin into that private road is quite busy. ! mean it's sort of a non-stop flow of traffic. ! shouldn't say non-stop but busy. Bill Tippmann: ! think ! see where you're going. The people exiting the drive thru would exit this way. Slagle: Correct. Correct, and what they would do is take a left as you just used your hand to go northward after they picked up their prescription from the east side of the building. They go up to the private road. Take a left. And sort of avoid what I'm going to call the intersection to the northwest, other than they would be one of the cars trying to get out to Galpin. And now when you just mentioned that they would go around twice, you would actually add another person coming from the back side of the store, taking a left and depending on how quick you can fill a prescription, they either drive around a number of times or they go park somewhere. Or go into your store and buy something and pick it up. You would know those details more than ! but I'm just asking, was it a consideration to put the drive thru on the east. Bill Tippmann: We have, of the 20 plus or minus stores that we're doing in the Minneapolis/St. Paul. Actually Minneapolis/St. Paul's probably closer to 40 stores. We have some with the drive thru on the rear. The trade off that operationally and to some extent from a traffic flow standpoint that we run into. The way the store functions, the pharmacy is about this size on the inside of the store. And there's a, call it a stopper on this corner with an entrance door here. The conflict you run into by sliding this around this side is you start running into, it can be resolved and we've done it on some of the 20 stores, where we have the drive thru here and the service elements here and there's a bit of a conflict. It can be worked out. But personally, ! mean strictly from a functional standpoint with respect to these two elements, it works cleaner this way. Can it be made to work? Probably. As we're studying maybe between now and council, quite possibly we'd be more than happy to explore those options with staff. 47 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: On the other end of that coin, is that the reason why you have this at the very corner because ! wonder in terms of the stacking the cars, whether it'd be better to move it up a little bit. Bill Tippmann: That's the reason. As with most retailers, CVS buys their components en masse and they, two reasons. One, they get economies of scale in buying all the counters. All those white counters you see inside. They all come in one package. This works with that element. The other is that of the elements in the store and, for lack of a better term, profitability of the store, a pharmacy is a large component of that and they have a very sophisticated method of how this whole thing functions that frankly I don't understand. It's for that reason they like to keep this, these two elements together. So that's why it's on the very corner of the store. Slagle: If I can just throw out. Per your comment earlier, which I appreciated about the stacking and the study, and if we can assume no more than 3 or 4 cars. It would potentially work on the east side of the building. You've shared that there's some models that you've done, and my guess is you have a number of layouts across the country that. Bill Tippmann: Most definitely. CVS has something like 5,000 stores so. Slagle: Yeah, so I'm sure they could figure out some way to make this work. Bill Tippmann: Oh it absolutely works because ! know we've solved several in Minneapolis. Or the greater Minneapolis area. Sacchet: Any other questions? Steve? Lillehaug: With that, would you consider pushing, getting rid of that northerly road and pushing the store to the north so you wouldn't have a road all the way around your building and possibly signing that as a one way? Entrance and exit. And let me also add, do you have, have you seen any problems with traffic coming into that northeast intersection? You know you've got cars lined up on the left of there and then cars on the right and they're coming right through the middle. It's not a typical situation. Have you seen any problems with that? Bill Tippmann: I personally have not. I know that the store is not a, it's not a Wal-Mart scale traffic generator. ! mean it's a convenience store. One, as we were, as the panel was talking ! was watching the plan and ! wondered, and perhaps Mark you could venture an opinion on this. Whether this drive can be tipped slightly that way to allow more stacking and less conflict here. ! think the trade off that we're going to run into though, and ! suspect it's the reason Mark drew it the way he did, is he's trying to create some distance between these two. And you get to a point, and ! know when these start getting closer and closer together, if not exactly aligned, you run into conflict. ! know ! heard traffic engineers say that in the past. It's possible that by skewing it slightly this way, we could pick up. Right now it appears that there's probably spaces for 3 cars to stack to 48 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 make this left before there's a conflict for somebody pulling in. Maybe we could pick up another car that way. Slagle: Would you, ifI could go on, would you be open to in essence a one way? Sacchet: On the east entrance? Slagle: Coming from the northwest it'd be one way going south and then to the east and then to the north and out. Bill Tippmann: Operationally I could see CVS resisting that. Sacchet: How about one way on the eastern entrance? Not necessarily on both. Bill Tippmann: One way on this one? I don't know that that would, I don't know what that would accomplish. If nothing else to accommodate trucks I would think you'd want to bring trucks. Sacchet: Yeah, with the garbage truck it would be an issue. I was thinking in terms of the drive thru, if it would be shifted around. That it'd just be a clear exit. Bill Tippmann: Most patrons of the drive thru are repeat customers, I know that. Sacchet: So they know. Bill Tippmann: Yeah, they'd begin to understand how it functions. Sacchet: Steve, still your turn. Lillehaug: What do you think about adding a few more trees on the west side. Increasing the screening from Galpin, and also staff's comments earlier about building that berm on the south side up to maybe reflect some of those existing contours that you're showing. Bill Tippmann: That would, I believe, in fact I had not even noticed before in sitting in the audience, I believe that you are correct. The topo shown on our original plan was one we received from the developer. It probably reflected a stock pile that sat there at one time that's not there anymore. Yeah, we're perfectly willing to do what screening and mounding we're required to do on this site. I guess our concern, as with any retailer, is we have an attractive building. We have signage on the building. We just want to make sure that that doesn't get screened. Lillehaug: So if you go back to a 10 foot high berm that's kind of shown there, it'd cover up that existing pylon sign out there, are you okay with that? 49 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Bill Tippmann: 10 foot would pretty well screen the building too. ! mean seriously, at eye level in a car, you're what? 3 or 4 feet high. You're not going to see the building. But again, screening the parking along this area and along this area is not a problem. Lillehaug: One other question. Roof equipment. Is there any roof equipment on this building? Bill Tippmann: It is but we have a high parapet wall on the from and on the two sides. I want to say it's 4 foot tall. Lillehaug: So you would say, if I'm standing on the property line all the way around your property, that it'd fully be screened? Would you concur with that? Bill Tippmann: Yeah. ! know in our prototypical drawings, if ! remember correctly, this side is down. The roof slopes this way. But ! know on these two sides it's at least 4 foot tall so it would hide any roof. Lillehaug: That's all I have, thanks. Keefe: Just have a couple of questions. One, what are that typical operating hours for something like this? Do you know? Bill Tippmann: Of the stores that CVS will locate in the Twin Cities area, they will, and I'm going to make up a number but it's close. It's probably 15 or 20 percent of the stores will be 24 hour stores. The reason being they need, they strategically locate those stores, and Walgreen's frankly does the same thing. They locate them in some proximity to the population if you need a prescription filled at 3:00 in the morning, you don't have to drive to St. Paul to get it filled. There is something reasonably close. Whether this store becomes one of those 15 or 20 percent, given the fact that we're on the edge of the market area, my believe is it's probably not going to be. So the typical operations hours are 11:00 to midnight, something like that. Keefe: Just a question, in regards to the entrances is on the southwest corner of this particular building. From a retail perspective, and from a building perspective, does it matter whether you're facing the street or the highway or would you rather, and from a retail perspective, enter, have the entrance where the entrance is. Or does it matter? Bill Tippmann: CVS, as most retailers, always want the entrance at the most visible location. In this case the corner. Keefe: That's all I have. Sacchet: I'm still struggling with this location of the drive thru, if you don't mind. ! mean you're basically allocating two lanes of traffic on the north side of the building to having that drive thru in the, on the north side. On the northeast corner. So there must be significant benefit by doing that if you put that much allocation of space for that. When 50 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 you could just have it on the east side, northeast corner and basically wouldn't need that wide of road to the north. So I'm trying to understand why, what's, ! mean, and ! don't know whether that's something that can easily be answered. Bill Tippmann: I can't stand here and answer it because I'm not the final decision maker on a lot of these things. ! mean this is a sophisticated operation, one of these stores. Sacchet: Because it appears to me if you're allocating that much space, that's going to be the whole length of the building. Two lanes of width, to have it up there, must be very significant. Bill Tippmann: It is absolutely a drive, not just a drive thru but the double drive thru. Sacchet: And to have it on the eastern corner rather than a little further west, I'm kind of perplexed. ! mean common sense wise ! would either shift it over to a little bit more west so you use that space a little more. It seems like you're wasting this whole space. Bill Tippmann: It's purely a function of how the pharmacy lays out inside the store itself. That's what drives this location on the corner, and frankly that's why, I'm sure that's what drives the location on this particular site. Even though there is additional cost and expense in constructing this drive as opposed to doing it here, this is the business model that they've created that they know works. Slagle: Mr. Chair, if ! may. The pharmacy is, safe to say, intentionally the further thing from the door. Bill Tippmann: Correct. Slagle: Okay. Sacchet: Because you have to go through the store and you see all the stuff you didn't plan to get and you get it. Okay. Yeah, that makes sense from that angle. Okay. Let's see. ! don't think ! have any other questions. Slagle: Thank you very much. Bill Tippmann: Thank you. Sacchet: Now this is a public hearing, and even though we don't have a crowd sitting here, ! still open the public hearing and if anybody wants to stand up and talk, this is the chance. And since there is nobody here, nobody can stand up to talk so ! close the public hearing. And bring it back to commissioners. Lillehaug: Can ! ask the staff one more question regarding the. Sacchet: Absolutely. 51 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Lillehaug: Regarding the pylon and the monument sign. Is that allowable? ! mean we already have the pylon sign there so we allow him a monument sign also? Generous: They get a monument sign. The pylon was supposed to be shared for the Galpin Business Center, so. Sacchet: Did you want to add something to that? Bill Tippmann: Yeah, I'm sorry. ! forgot to address... Lillehaug: And I'm not opposed to it either. I'm just asking. Bill Tippmann: ! wanted to give Bob's clarification. The staff report said that we are too close with this pylon. Sacchet: With the monument. Bill Tippmann: What is the required setback? Generous: It's half the required setback so. Bill Tippmann: So it's halfway to this? So it's somewhere back here? Generous: Yeah, and ! thought...to meet the setback. Sacchet: So you're okay with that? Bill Tippmann: Yes. Sacchet: Okay, thank you. Glad you clarified that. Alright, questions, comments, discussion. Slagle: ! can start. ! think it would be a wonderful addition. ! can share with the group that ! cannot support it as it's currently stated. And I'm referring to the site plan. If the applicant would be willing to produce the drive thru on the east side, possibly move the building a little further north. And either minimize or delete that lane to the north, ! would be open to that. But ! really believe that if we do not, if we don't encourage cars to exit out the northeast corner of this parcel, we're going to have a mess on that northwest corner. So, everything else I'm okay with, including the pylon sign. Sacchet: The high one. Alright. There's a comment. Want to go this way? Lillehaug: Can ! ask a point of clarification on the pylon sign? Are we talking a different pylon sign other than what's out there? 52 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Slagle: I'm okay with, staff is recommending denial but I'm suggesting I'm okay with that. Sacchet: So they would change the one that exists and make it higher? Lillehaug: And what would happen with Kwik Trip's then? Sacchet: Kwik Trip has a 50 foot one. Slagle: Correct. I'm suggesting that Kwik Trip. Sacchet: You're not suggesting two of them? Slagle: Yes ! am. Sacchet: You are suggesting two? Slagle: That's my. Sacchet: He likes signs. Nothing we can do about that. Slagle: Well ! think we're asking the applicant to do some things, if my thoughts are shared, in exchange for that maybe. Sacchet: Alright, Steve... Lillehaug: Now I'll make my comments. Alright. I'm pretty close with Commissioner Slagle here, but this is a PUD. Higher standards than a typical development. So with that said, ! would like to see more screening on the south and on the west, ensuring that we get an adequate berm there to screen the parking. Not 10 foot tall to screen a building but at least the parking. Entrance, the northwest entrance. We need to push that, or ! think we should require pushing that back as far away from Galpin as possible. Yes, it's not ideal to have those intersections with Kwik Trip and that close or not perfectly lined up but I'd rather have a problem there than out on Galpin. Get them off the regional road. Have a more of a problem on the internal. ! think that'd be safer than out on the regional road. We didn't talk about this but if I'm coming from the north where ! live, going to Kwik Trip or not, maybe we should also have a walk. There's a connector walk going out to the sidewalk on the southwest corner. I'm thinking maybe one, or maybe I'm going overboard here but on the northwest corner across and connect a walk there too. Otherwise they're going to be walking through the parking lot. So if that's something that could easily be added, ! think you know it would add a little bit to it. Staff indicated on page 8 that they're going to be communicating with Carver County about a, and this is independent of this development but about a no U turn. I'm not fully bought off on that and ! don't think ! would support that because vehicles are going to leave inbetween Kwik Trip and CVS, sorry, by mistake or whatever. And if they can't make a U turn there, they're going to go further up and they're going to do something up in residential 53 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 neighborhoods or something. They're going to be coming through my neighborhood and ! don't want that. No. Slagle: But point of clarification. Why wouldn't you think they would take a left on West 78th? Lillehaug: Why wouldn't they? Because they want to, people do it now. They do it all the time and that's probably why you have it in there. You're getting complaints about it. People go up there and make a U turn. You've probably seen it. Slagle: No, what I'm suggesting is, when they go north, like you're taking your...and it says no U turn, if they're going to go east. They take a right on West 78th. And as habits will form... Lillehaug: Alright, ! support you. Good deal. It's an enforcement issue. Keefe: We need some internal signage on that private road that are saying exit to the east and then you could take a left on West 78th and then you could get out to 5 that way. That might be helpful as well. Saam: Yeah, that's something else we talked about. Help to just get these motorists to quit taking that U turn because we're getting tons of complaints and frankly it can be dangerous. People coming from the north going south on Galpin going 40 or whatever they are going, and somebody's going to whip a U'y right there. Lillehaug: Okay, scratch that then. One other issue ! do want to raise, and this isn't on the CVS site but on Kwik Trip site. Right on the east of that car wash, people are going up that and then they get up there, they're not taking a right. But they're taking a left and they can't cross the median and they're driving out towards Galpin on the wrong side of the road and ! think I've seen it at least twice, maybe 3 times so there probably should be a do not enter sign on that Kwik Trip site. Sorry, about deviating from your application here but. ! bring that to your attention, thank you. And ! support what Commissioner Slagle is saying on, I'm not bought off on this site routing of the traffic in there and ! think a better scenario would be as you indicated. ! would support something different but not this. Sacchet: Dan. Keefe: The applicant said that this operates a little bit like a Walgreen's and so ! started thinking about where I've seen a Walgreen's and I've actually been in one on 5 and Eden Prairie Road. There happens to be one that sits up you know in approximately a similar location as this one does here and the way that you drive into that one is you take a right up north on Eden Prairie Road. Then you take a right into a street and they actually route you to what appears to be the northeast entrance. Then you come back in and their entrance was actually on the northwest corner, not facing 5 but it's actually on the northwest corner. Now I'm not aware whether they have a drive thru and pick up 54 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 pharmacy or not, but there are some similarities there. I see if the traffic to this site is similar to what it is there, there's going to be a lot of traffic problems in this northwest corner. And ! think we should look at understanding that better, just in terms of, it' s just going to be so congested that we would have real difficulties. ! would think that you know either pushing it down and just making one entrance. ! understand the need for the drive thru. ! think Rich has a good idea about potentially moving it to the east side. ! understand the reason why ! asked the applicant whether they would move the entrance to the northwest. ! don't know that that Walgreen's necessarily works the best either so, but just from my own sort of drive through on that property, it does seem to work alright. And the congestion, although there is some congestion there as well, seems to work okay but ! just think that everybody' s going to be coming in and off this thing from the south. You're going to make that turn. People are going to be trying to get out from the drive thru, plus you've got traffic going out from the entrance going back up that corner. You've got people coming out of Kwik Trip and that corner's going to be a disaster ! think so ! think we really need to take a harder look at it. Sacchet: Bethany. Tjornhom: I think it's fine. I think it's a good building. I think it's something that will be an asset to the community as far as having a pharmacy with a drive thru, but ! have to concur with the rest of my commissioners that some more study has to be done with the flow of traffic and that corner. Sacchet: Well, well, well, well. Here we are. So it looks like we want to see more on this traffic, and it's hard to disagree from this from my vantage point. With all due respect, and obviously it' s been thought through from your angle quite a bit. On the other hand you're putting this in many places. ! mean the whole idea is that this is a cookie cutter type of thing that applies. Let's approve a concept and then a lot of your thinking, the design is based on what's proven in other places. ! do have to agree that somehow the site is a little different from a cookie cutter and what ! hear is that we're leaning to table this and ask you have a close look at it. ! mean I'm not a traffic specialist. It's hard for me to judge this and then make an objective statement about it. But ! do share a concern that it's, the flow of it. It seems like all the traffic's going to come in on that northwesterly entrance, which is going to potentially create a congestion. ! don't know how big a congestion. ! can't judge that but maybe it could be mitigated by having the drive thru on the back side, as it is a possibility as you affirmed. What's the time line? Question from staff. What's the time line for this? Generous: We're still within the 60 days. Sacchet: Within the 60 days so if we would table this and ask the applicant to look at this a little further. Work with staff to see that, would you want to address this briefly? Bill Tippmann: Given the fact that the time line that we're on, first of all we would like nothing more than to break ground on this property in the next 30 days if at all possible. If it's possible. Given the fact that we are approximately 4 weeks away from the council 55 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 meeting, if we were to get a recommendation this evening, if it would be possible to get a recommendation that we work with staff on these issues between now and council, and in the event that we can satisfy staff, that the best solution has been found, that we then have the opportunity to go to council. Sacchet: Well the impression ! get from the comments that ! hear is that there is enough concern that we would like to see it again. Now, how quickly is that possible, in terms of time line? Generous: Theoretically you could get it back on for July 6th, which was going to be a work session. Sacchet: We have a work session that we could possibly put it in there. And then it could go to council when? Generous: The 12th is we did. Sacchet: The 12th. Generous: That's the same time. Sacchet: Which would be the same time it would have gone otherwise? So that way we wouldn't additionally slow you down. That's what I'm trying to establish here. Because, and ! don't know whether I'm mis-reading the comments. It seems like comments were pretty clear and ! do share the concerns to some extent. Personally ! probably could be talked into what you're suggesting but ! don't think what ! hear that. Bill Tippmann: I mean that would give us approximately 3 weeks to develop whatever we all conclude is the best. Sacchet: ! mean it's a combination. Where I'm coming from is, ! think what we're asking you is just do another step in looking at this in the context of this site. It looks like your main focus, which ! understands, makes a lot of sense. ! mean you have your formula and it fits. The space is there so you plop it in. And what ! hear we're asking you is just go and look at it a little more from the context rather than from the operation. Rather than look at the design from the inside out, look at it from the outside a little more, and I'm sure you did that to some extent but we're asking you to do that a little further. ! don't know whether I'm doing justice to the comments. Bill Tippmann: I think that's a very good solution. Appreciate the solution. Slagle: And ! would draw out the fact that you have some models as has been based upon what we've just discussed would make this next 3 weeks easier. ! would also ask, if possible with staff, just go out to the site if you haven't already together, and just view the traffic coming from Kwik Trip on any given call it morning or evening, and you'll quickly see ! think that northwest corridor would be quite busy. 56 Planning Commission Meeting - June 15, 2004 Sacchet: What ! hear is, ! don't think we're asking for much of a redesign. ! mean it could possibly be a little bit of shifted north or something but we're not asking to rotate or shift anything major. What we're asking is looking at this traffic thing in terms of the two entrances. In terms of the location of the drive thru because ! mean the situation on your back side where you guys have two stacking lanes and then one lane goes opposite and then the other lane goes, ! mean it's a little bit irky. And ! don't know, maybe this is the best solution. Maybe that's proven to work but it looks like that's something that hasn't really been studied very much. Bill Tippmann: ! think we can all come out with a better project if we take our time. Sacchet: Okay. So thank you for clarifying that. Appreciate that. ! think with that we're ready to make a motion. Lillehaug: I'll make a motion to table this request. Sacchet: We have a motion. Is there a second? Slagle: Second. Lillehaug moved, Slagle seconded that the Planning Commission table Site Plan #04-21 for Bear Creek Capital LLC, and Chanhassen Development, LLC, CVS Pharmacy. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. Slagle: Staff is clear of what we're looking at? Sacchet: Did we make it clear enough? Okay. Of what we're asking, okay. That's all. Well thank you so much for, it's a great project and we definitely want to welcome you to this town. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Slagle noted the verbatim and summary minutes of the Planning Commission meeting dated June 1, 2004 as presented. Chairman Sacchet adjourned the Planning Commission meeting at 9:30 p.m. Submitted by Kate Aanenson Community Development Director Prepared by Nann Opheim 57