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PC Minutes 08-19-2014Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 that we’re really minimalizing it. If we’re going to have a motion like this that we minimalize the impact. Weick: You mean with a smaller structure? Aller: It could be a smaller structure. It could be the setback that goes to the very edge of the bluff setback so it’s only the minimal amount that is needed or is required to allow them to move forward. And where would that line be? Aanenson: Chairman I think we’re pretty confident that’s where we located it. I think if your condition is going to, are there other things we can do to mitigate, drainage coming off the bluff. I think that’s something we can look at and make that, if that’s one of your conditions that we can work to see if we need to provide something there to, if there’s runoff in that area. If it’s concentrated or something that we could look at something there. But we believe that that’s the spot. Aller: That’s the spot. Aanenson: With least amount of impact, correct. Aller: And our hardship is in reality this, the easement. Does anybody have any thoughts on runoff or erosion created by the building or an accessory structure? Okay. Tennyson: If you look at it it’s meeting all of the requirements in the findings for the variance then I’m not sure you have to look beyond that. Aller: Alright, I have a motion and a second. All those in favor. Weick moved, Undestad seconded the Chanhassen Planning Commission acting as the Board of Appeals and Adjustments approves a variance from the bluff setback requirements to allow a 18 foot by 12 foot water oriented structure 17 feet from the toe of a bluff on property zoned Single Family Residential District (RSF), Planning Case 2014-20 and adoption of the Findings of Fact and Recommendation. All voted in favor, except Chairman Aller who opposed, and the motion carried with a vote of 6 to 1. PUBLIC HEARING: 960 CARVER BEACH ROAD: REQUEST FOR A VARIANCE TO EXCEED THE IMPERVIOUS SURFACE LIMITATION TO CONSTRUCT A DRIVEWAY ON PROPERTY ZONED SINGLE FAMILY RESIDENTIAL (RSF) AND LOCATED AT 960 CARVER BEACH ROAD. APPLICANT/OWNER: CHRISTOPHER & BARBARA KING, PLANNING CASE 2014-21. Aanenson: Thank you Chairman Aller, members of the Planning Commission. This item, 960 Carver Beach Road, Planning Case 2014-21. The applicants are Christopher and Barbara King. The location is Carver Beach and as I mentioned 960 off of Carver Beach Road. This item did appear before the Planning Commission in, excuse me was approved in August 12, 2013. The City Council approved a variance for hard cover of 5.8 percent to allow for a total hard cover of 22 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 30.8 with the following conditions of approval. They provide a tree survey. The building be limited to a split level or two story design and the builder apply for a building permit. All those were accomplished and the buyer bought this lot and moved forward with the building permit. Meeting the setback requirements and meeting the hard surface requirement. But as the as-built survey came through it was determined you know to meet the 30.8 percent impervious requirement that the driveway was rather sculpted in a way that didn’t make it very efficient for the applicant to or the owner to get into the third stall garage. Again it met all the requirements but in practicality it did get permitted through the planning office and unfortunately this isn’t the type of driveway that we would approve like this and it did go through that way. 10 feet at the narrowest part and then getting to that sharp corner, and I’ll show again illustratively when you look at that picture from here. Difficult to get in and again a 10 foot for a 2 car garage pretty minimal. Even a third stall. It is a 3 stall garage but I want to point out, I put into the staff report the dimensions of the third stall and it meets the, really pretty minimal as far as depth requirements. When you look at a typical 3 car garage it’s pretty narrow and the depth isn’t that great. Also in the depth of the garage it also is encumbered by the fact that you have to go up the stairs to get into the house so typically on a, someone that would want the additional storage. While this doesn’t have additional storage space for a shed or something. The hard cover is used up. I think the owners desire to provide that went astray in their desire to have that and also in our approval of it in this form and fashion. Some of the compromises should have been made but unfortunately it did go through. One of the issues that was brought up by the Water Resources Coordinator is you know when we had the severe rains in June the, in the Carver Beach Road, that’s what these pictures are looking flash flooding in this area. And this is Carver Beach Road. Runoff that would be in this area. There is minimal storm drainage and this is one of the older parts in town so you have surface water that travels where it will to find that spot to, you know there’s no curb and to where it needs to go. Again this is kind of Kerber Pond. Kerber Boulevard as it’s going towards the pond there. You can see the overflow so this is one of the concerns when we look at drainage as a whole in this area, why the hard surface requirement is something that we consider. I just also want to point out that we changed our requirements for hard cover and permitting zoning permits and that goes back to the case we just discussed and we changed that in 2005 so now we require everybody to get a zoning permit. So a zoning permit doesn’t necessarily mean a building permit but we want to check to make sure that you’re not exceeding your hard cover. You’re meeting the setbacks. You’re not putting a structure over the utility easement. Those sort of things so it may just be someone that wants to put up a retaining wall or that sort of thing that’s under 4 feet. We typically don’t take a permit for that but we check to make sure that they’re not putting it into the utility easement. How is that impacting drainage in the area? So we call those zoning permits and then we work with our residents to make sure that we understand what they’re doing and how that would effect so in the Carver Beach area as a whole we’ve, the Water Resources Coordinator has been working on doing some improvements in the area and I think next year’s street projects or the year after we’re going to be doing some additional projects up in the Carver Beach area to manage some of this so these were the comments from the Water Resources and this is kind of the larger drainage area and the home kind of up in this area, this LB48 would be the basin. Kind of where that’s impacting so I just want to emphasize as the Water Resources Coordinator was kind of reluctant to say you know yeah. We can go beyond that so the applicant proposed a driveway that was at 34 percent. Now I kind of clicked this because you can see here the existing driveway. Just take a pointer here. See if this works. Kind of follow my little red pen here. So this is the existing driveway. So this is what the applicants wanted to do. So this would allow you when you pull up a car to get groceries out. Get a child out of the back seat. Get you to the front door and then 23 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 this is a radius then to get you into that third staff with additional there. The staff’s goal was to try to minimize that and working to try to reduce minimal hard cover to make it functional and then reduce the amount of hard cover. So in taking that into consideration the staff’s recommendation would be the 33.3 percent but then also to mitigate that by providing that extra volume that was added to the site by creating a rain garden or using impervious pavers and that was the recommendation from the Water Resources so that would be the only way to move forward with that would be to minimize it and then also to compensate for that or mitigate that by creating that rain garden. So they’d have to create, calculate what that volume would be and provide that. I also wanted to let you know that we did receive a number of calls on this going back to this house shouldn’t have been built and again you know we’ve gone through that discussion. Legally the right to build on the house. We’ll take some responsibility for the way the driveway got shaped. Again it probably shouldn’t have been approved that way because it’s really not functional so we did want to resolve that as far as the aesthetics of that whole thing and also there’s complaints about the cars from this home parking on the drive. On the street. It is not marked no parking. We do allow parking on the public street. Obviously there’s winter parking rules that would have to be posted no parking but in hoping that the driveway is improved that the neighbors in good faith then would try to keep their cars in the driveway. This street does act kind of, as a minor collector so sight lines are improvement over there. And I also did include in your packet a letter from one of the neighbors too concerned about that. I also want to say in this Carver Beach area as a whole, going back to that 2005, there are probably other properties that are over. When we did all those PUD’s 2 years ago when we did all 30 some of them, we found all kinds of interesting things out in the older parts of town where properties were set next to the street. Fence lines went quite a bit over neighboring properties and things weren’t permitted as they are today so it’s unfortunate this happened and we’ll apologize for our part of it. Again probably the third stall was probably not the best choice for this but this is what we have today. So we are recommending, the staff’s, the 33.4 which would be an additional 2.5 percent and then with the conditions in the staff report which included that they provide that mitigation area so with that I’d be happy to answer any questions that you may have. Aller: Questions? This was before us a year ago so it’s fairly familiar to all of us I believe. And then I guess when we did those amendments we looked at this whole area and we were trying to make sure that we didn’t punish homeowners because of the natural scenario that they had the different lots that were out there and the way things were. We just wanted to make sure that people in the future knew what they were, when they bought something, what they could build and what was allowable. Aanenson: Yep, that’s correct Chairman Aller. I think part of the goal was to let people know. You know we tried to simplify when people were doing title checks to sell their home, we had all kinds of anomalies out there so we wanted to clarify their PUD’s so it was simpler for someone else trying to list their property and then also an opportunity to educate people on what now we require moving forward but what’s out there is out there. Aller: Great. And then do we have any idea of the calculations that would need to be done for the rain garden if that’s something we look at? What that would entail. Fauske: We would certainly work with the applicant to devise a plan of something that’s amenable to what would meet their requirements. Either porous pavement. Some sort of rain 24 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 garden feature. Just an attempt to try to make an effort and we would help them with those calculations and siting of those amenities. Aller: The motion before us would set that amount at the 25% which is the current restriction. Not what’s actually on the property, correct? Fauske: Correct. So anything over 25% would be treated through a porous pavement, rain garden, or a combination of any amenity. Aller: And then porous pavements, how would we enforce the use of porous pavement if somebody was to pour sand on it or alter it in some form or fashion? Fauske: I think we’d look back to the variance procedure that was granted. I mean if, as part of being granted a variance and being allowed to keep the non-conformity that exists, one of the conditions is to have that. As far as a, to bring up a situation where this has happened before. I don’t have one of those unfortunately. We are on some new territory here. We would certainly hope that the current homeowner and any future homeowner would agree that any porous pavement, rain garden, such thing would be a benefit not only to their property but to the whole neighborhood and would want to keep it that way. Aller: Krista, you have something to add? Spreiter: Yes. Thanks. Just to add to that. For projects where we’ve done some sort of stormwater treatment, usually there’s a maintenance agreement that is signed by the homeowner and it kind of spells out what their maintenance responsibilities are and how long they have to perform those maintenance activities. However usually it is terminated when the house is sold so that’s what we’ve done in the past. Aanenson: I think that’s something you might want to consider as an addition to, if you do choose to recommend approval I think what Krista just stated is important to have a maintenance agreement on this because we’re giving a variance. A variance runs with the property. Often times the engineering department works to find alternatives to provide when they’re doing street recon projects, to provide residents that are willing to work with them or want to do some improvements on their own but in this case, because you are granting a variance you could make it run with the property. Aller: Thank you. That’s what I was looking for. And this is a problem area with stormwater management. Fauske: That’s correct. Aller: So this is, this would be a good thing to have. Either a rain garden. Some additional if we’re going to move forward, or even without. All the homeowners should consider rain gardens or, this area is in dire need of making sure that we don’t have that stormwater running into the lake. 25 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 Fauske: Correct. As Kate alluded to, we are looking at doing a resurfacing project in this area next year and we will be looking at alternative measures for stormwater mitigation with that project. Aller: Okay, thank you. Any other questions at this point? Okay, if we can have the applicant come forward. If they’d like to make a presentation. Sir, if you could state your name and address for the record. Chris King: Hi. My name is Chris King. I live at 960 Carver Beach Road. Aller: Welcome Mr. King. Chris King: Thank you. I’m going to just read because I’m not very good at speaking if you don’t mind. Aller: That’s okay. None of us are. Chris King: So good evening. Thank you for taking the time to hear our request. My family and I moved here a couple of months ago and love the city of Chanhassen and what it has to offer us. The last thing we wanted to do is move in and immediately cause problems. We wanted to wait a little while so, no. Just kidding. We do however feel that our request for an increase in our driveway is important and reasonable. We would like to thank Mr. Gerhardt, Mr. Generous, Ms. Aanenson. I hope I’m saying that correctly, and others involved for their recommendation and support as we realize 33.4 percent would go a long way to help our situation. We would however still like to respectfully request the full 34 percent that we have applied for because we feel it better fits our needs. When we made the request of 34 percent we did so understanding that this property has already had a 36 percent hard cover variance granted to Anita Benson in 2001 which was allowed to expire. Since that time the City has made significant upgrades to the drainage system. We also realize that Chanhassen’s population continues to grow but we don’t feel like our request will have a significant impact. We are also willing to follow the team’s recommendation that we either use pervious material or plant a rain garden. Another factor we feel should be considered is our proximity to Carver Beach Park which is basically one house down from us so there’s a house separating us from a very large open area. We are even willing to create a larger garden to accommodate the extra .6 percent if you were willing to bring it up to 34 percent. We also feel the full 34 percent is reasonable because we are a social family with young children and often host guests. At 33.4 percent we will not be able to fit as many cars as we would if the end of the driveway were wide enough, therefore creating the need to park on the street. Carver Beach Road is a very busy, very fast road with motorized traffic and this can pose a safety issue. Our house is actually positioned at the top of a hill so as you come over the hill it can kind of be a blind area. It’s hard to see there. We also feel our request would meet an aesthetic need for our neighborhood. Our neighbors have been supportive and welcoming but we do know that our current driveway and even the driveway at 33.4 percent will have an unusual look. One neighbor has even expressed the concern that it may be diminishing property value. Finally we would like to bring to the attention the fact, excuse me. Finally we would like to bring attention to the fact that in the report it was noted that we already applied for and were approved for a hard cover variance. This is not true as the variance was granted to the previous owner, Mr. David Moore whom I 26 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 purchased the land from. Thank you again for taking the time to hear our request. We are excited to move forward with this project and begin our long residency in the city. Thanks. Aller: Thank you Mr. King. Any questions of Mr. King? Great, thank you. Chris King: Thank you. Aller: Okay open up the public hearing portion of the meeting. Anyone wishing to speak either for or against this item can do so at this time. If you can please state your name and address for the record, that would be great. Carol Zalusky: My name is Carol Zalusky and I live at 960 Western Drive. Aller: Welcome. Carol Zalusky: Two streets over and I kind of represent some concerns of our community. The people in our area. We’re very disappointed to see over 25% coverage for that building even being approved because there have been other people in our neighborhood that have asked for variances to expand their home. Not even getting close to this degree of coverage and you know that’s been denied in the past. I mean I’m talking several years ago. Not current but you know the push has been in our community to try to have the green space. I would like to know how much the actual structure covers. Of that building. Not considering driveway, sidewalks. How much does the structure cover? Aanenson: It’s approximately 34 by 20. That’s for the house itself and then the garage is. Carol Zalusky: The house and garage. You know the building itself. Aanenson: We’re adding it up here. 1,292. Aller: 1,292. Carol Zalusky: And so what percentage is that? Of the square footage of the lot? Generous: It’s 21 percent. Carol Zalusky: Okay, 21 percent so you’re almost to the 25 just with the structure. Aanenson: Right. Aller: Right. Carol Zalusky: So have they considered, you know rain gardens are a great idea. There’s not a lot of extra space you know when you’ve had that much coverage so how much really could you do? You know it’s kind of on a slope already you know so how could the rain gardens fit in the front yard? Into really cover drainage coming off of the home. 27 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 Aller: If we were to add conditions to this, my understanding is what happens is that those conditions would have to be met before the variance could take place so. Carol Zalusky: Okay. Aller: It would be a matter of them working with the City to determine and calculate what that percentage is and that’s why I asked the question before. What amount are we looking for in some kind of remediation. Carol Zalusky: Right. Aller: And we’re going back to if the property was 25 percent we want to meet that so that’s the calculations that would be involved in the motion the way it stands right now. Carol Zalusky: Okay. Alright. Aller: Does that make sense? Carol Zalusky: Right. I mean and I know there are other materials. I mean now they have these pavers that, you know they’re a hard surface that you can still drive on but what kind of grass grows through so you have more drainage taking place so just want to see if other things could be entertained so, I mean we’re just very concerned about. Aller: And I think those are very good question and very good points and I think that’s one of the things that the staff was recommending was that they use the type of materials that will allow. Carol Zalusky: The pervious, yeah. Aller: The water to go through and then seep into the ground slowly and then we have the ability to slow that stormwater runoff. Carol Zalusky: Right, right, right so I guess if we’re going to approve a variance we should have a requirement of the better surface area so that’s just an opinion of the neighborhood. Aller: Thank you and I remember the neighborhood coming the last time so, tell them hi. Any other individuals wishing to come forward to speak either for or against. Seeing no one coming forward, we will close the public hearing on the matter before us and go ahead and ask for comments or questions or discussion. Undestad: I guess just one question of Alyson. Their comment about getting that extra point, a bigger rain garden, is that even a possibility or no? Fauske: We can work with the applicant to provide additional, additional surface either in a rain garden or as stated before. Either a porous pavement or some other amenity for the additional. I don’t see it being an issue but as Kate indicated the variance isn’t finalized until they’ve met all the requirements of it so if there would be an issue that came up with granting that additional .4 28 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 percent, if that came up during the design phases that that isn’t conceivable then the variance would only stand for what they’ve provided. Aanenson: Then I think what we looked at too, talking with the Water Resources Coordinator, it may take two. You know divide that so you have that front yard. It might be two on either side of the driveway or something like that. Undestad: Okay. Aller: Any additional comments or questions? How do we feel about the straight up variance? Is that something anyone is interested in entertaining or, I prefer if we’re going to consider it all to go to the additional conditions. Especially in light of the history of the property. It’s been before the council. It’s been before us. My first blush response, hearing that it was going to come back on was to say no until I read the potential for the conditions. Then my position soften so interested in hearing positions on that. Weick: If you attach conditions about the type of material or whatever, rain gardens, whatever it is, would you be inclined to approve the homeowner request of 34 percent or stick with the city request of 33 percent? I guess if we’re going to put conditions would you consider, I mean we’re basically talking about that little chunk. Aller: Well I think that’s what Commissioner Undestad was getting to when he was asking the question. Is it feasible in the first place to even go up if we’re going to go to that 25 percent? I think it’s absolutely should be a requirement in my opinion to have it meet the 25 percent requirement for the runoff so that we can basically remediate the condition of the property so that that neighborhood doesn’t suffer because of the building. And then the question is, is it worth fighting over the extra one percent? If it makes the value of the property an enhancement in the use of the property, an enhancement for all involved, including the neighbors. We’re looking at a 3 car garage as opposed to 2 car garage. And I think all the neighbors would appreciate the fact that they can park on their driveway or in the garage as opposed to on the street. Undestad: So Kate, if we looked at it with, if we approve it with the additional. With the full 34 percent and they go back and find out, okay there’s not enough room for rain gardens and we can’t get it down to the 25 percent, does it automatically go back to the 33.4? Aanenson: Yes. Our condition would be that it’s driven by they provide that 25 percent. Whatever’s over that 25 percent. Undestad: Okay. Aanenson: Yeah. If that’s the way you’re going. Undestad: Well I, you know if they can get the 25 percent and if at the end of the day they meet the 25 percent and keep their cars off the street. Aller: I mean the alternative is a strict one. Typically would be required that we’d just say no but here we’re presented with a unique. 29 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 Hokkanen: Another unique. Aller: Opportunity to hopefully resolve the issue without creating a problem for new owners. Had it be the old owners I’d probably be feeling a little different about it. Undestad: And that brings up another question Kate. On the agreements, they have to enter into the maintenance and agreements for these wetlands or the, sorry the rain gardens but it was mentioned that that expires with the sale of the house. We could put it in where it would run… Aanenson: Right. I think we’re talking about a street recon project or some of that is applied and say I’d like to get some funding to look at this for some alternative but in this circumstance it runs with the property. A variance runs with the property so if they would sell the house and the future homeowner would be bound by maintaining that rain garden. Undestad: Okay. Aanenson: Yeah, which is similar to conditions that we would put on any other property. Hokkanen: And they would have to disclose that with the sale of the property. Aanenson: Exactly. Hokkanen: Right. Aller: Any additional thoughts? Comments? Carol Zalusky: Can I ask another question? Aller: Sure, come on up. We’ll open up the public hearing. Carol Zalusky: Just because I’m really familiar with that area and I don’t know about this house but some of the homes pump water constantly out of their sump pumps. I mean our neighbor next door, every 15 minutes even in these drier periods. Swoosh. Swoosh. So you know that also is a little concern of mine. You know there’s another additional water flow coming out of these homes and I don’t know about this home if that’s on a spring also because there are so many springs that have pretty high water table. Just another consideration in terms of the water. Aller: Thank you. While we have it open does anyone else wish to speak on it? Alright, we’ll close it up again. And then I think going to the 25 percent is really the end result which would resolve that issue. I mean the water’s going to come. The question is where is it coming from? Is it really this particular parcel’s problem? And then on top of that if we’re reducing our flow to 25 percent, I think that’s what’s before us and what we’re considering at this point. Aanenson: Can I just clarify one thing for the record too. While this applicant didn’t apply for a variance. That was the kind of the rule set for that lot you know so, they were given a variance that they had to work within and unfortunately they chose to go wider garage and here we are today because if we would have stuck with the 2 car, how it was represented, we wouldn’t be in 30 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 this situation so we’ll take our responsibility for that but putting the third stall is kind of what was the tipping point here. Now we’re trying to fix the situation. Aller: Which is the alternative. We can toe the hard line and say no. They were before us. We gave them a variance. It was approved by the City and it was approved before council. I mean clearly it’s a buildable lot and all those other issues are gone. And then what we ended up with was not as represented and it’s non-conforming. Undestad: But we did approve the building permit. Aanenson: Right. Undestad: For a 3 car garage. Aller: Which, I mean that’s why the compromise is a good one. Undestad: Right. Aller: Even though I think, and the City’s position would be clear and this is what we granted. You provided something that wasn’t and you shouldn’t be able to rely or hold us to the fire for something additional at this point. I think that’s happened before in the City and the City has prevailed so, I think the potential to compromise is better for the. Hokkanen: For everybody, right. And the homeowner. Aller: And certainly for the homeowner who came in and. Hokkanen: And the neighborhood. Aller: Had no idea what was going on. Hokkanen: Right. Aller: Any further discussion? Comments. Yusuf: I have a question for city staff. Is hard cover just straight up hard cover all the time or do you guys have calculations that you may adjust depending on what materials you use? Aanenson: Typically it’s anything is a hard cover. The only exception would be if someone was to put a deck on that’s not sitting on the ground. We don’t count that as, so this property has exhausted any other future outdoor sort of thing and I guess that’s kind of why when it went through is kind of looked at for the 2 stalls so we could use some, you know so. Aller: Yeah we would have to remove, for instance we could take away the sidewalk and put a driveway in but there would be a trade-off. Aanenson: Right. Right. 31 Chanhassen Planning Commission – August 19, 2014 Aller: And that’s really not a good use of the property. Aanenson: Those are kind of the practical difficulties. I think in looking at this permit originally came in with a patio and I believe it was switched to a deck so they could extend that so it’d be above ground so worked hard on trying to make that reasonable. Aller: I’ll entertain a stab at a motion. Anybody have an idea of what kind of number they want to put on what I’m hearing? Undestad: I’ll make a run at it here Chair. Aller: Commissioner Undestad has a motion. Undestad: I make a motion that staff recommends that the Planning Commission, as the Board of Appeals and Adjustments approve a variance for an additional 3.2 percent for a total of 34 percent hard surface coverage subject to the five conditions in the staff report, and adopt the attached Findings of Fact and Decision. And the fifth being a maintenance agreement that runs with the property. Hokkanen: Second. Aller: I have a motion by Commissioner Undestad, a second by Commissioner Hokkanen. Any further discussion? Undestad moved, Hokkanen seconded that the Planning Commission acting as the Board of Appeals and Adjustments approves an additional 3.2 percent hard cover variance to permit the construction of a driveway to a single family home subject to the following conditions, and adoption of the attached Findings of Fact and Decision: 1.The property owner shall submit an as-built survey to ensure additional hard cover does not exceed 3.2 percent, to a total of 34 percent hard cover. 2.The driveway expansion shall substantially conform to the schematic as shown in the staff report. 3.Provide mitigation for the increased volume through some type of infiltration practice which abstracts a volume equal to that volume which runs off the area of impervious that are over the allowed 25 percent (i.e. rain garden), or use an alternate pervious surface for the construction of the driveway. 4.The applicant apply for a zoning permit for the driveway expansion and rain garden. 5.A maintenance agreement shall run with the property. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 7 to 0. Aller: Motion carries. I think that’s a good result. 32