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PC Minutes 09-04-2018Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 8 Walters: And that had unique standards. Tietz: I think that one was 10 or 12 feet. It’s not a 5 or 6 foot sign. It’s a. Walters: My recollection is 12 or 13 feet. Tietz: It was significant I remember because we had some discussion about it’s height and location. Aller: Right. Undestad: Well and that I think that signage for the pick up area part of that shows how retail is changing. Businesses are changing. They need to change with it and this is part of it I think when they have to put a new, the liquor store in there. We never had one, we never had drive up, pick up your groceries you know and so I think, and again to keep it in the full PUD package out there I think that’s the way it should be put in there. Aller: And just to follow up on that a little bit. We also discussed the fact that there will not be drive up pick up of alcohol. Undestad: Right. Aller: Any additional comments? Questions? Concerns? Otherwise I have a motion and a second. Undestad moved, Randall seconded that the Chanhassen Planning Commission recommends that the City Council approve the Chanhassen Retail Center Planned Unit Development Amendment 2018-15, and adopts the attached Findings of Fact and Recommendation. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 6 to 0. Aller: Motion carries and we move onto item number 2. Thank you very much. 7644 SOUTH SHORE DRIVE: CONSIDER A VARIANCE TO INSTALL BOULDER WALL AND PATIO IN BLUFF SETBACK AREA. Walters: Alright item number 2 is Planning Case 2018-16. A variance for 7644 South Shore Drive. This item will go before, if appealed will go before the City Council on September 24th. It is a variance to place a boulder wall, a flagstone stepper path and a patio within the bluff setback and impact zone for 7644 South Shore Drive. So the property is, let me get my little laser pointer here. Is zoned planned unit development residential. In this PUD lots are required to have 11,700 square feet. They have a 30 foot front yard setback. 10 foot side yard setback. Are limited to 25 percent lot coverage within the shoreland overlay district and then for Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 9 properties located on a bluff such as the property in question there’s a 30 foot bluff setback or 5 feet for structures that exist pre-1991 and then there’s also a 20 foot bluff impact zone which prevents vegetative clearing and removal. Topographical disturbances within 20 feet of the top of the bluff. So the existing condition for the property, it is a 43,604 square foot lot. As of the survey that was approved with the September 29, 2017 building permit for the remodel and addition of the house it had 15.57 percent lot cover. There is a non-conforming 9.8 foot west side yard setback and their house is a non-conforming 20 feet from the top of the bluff and then there is a deck which has a patio underneath and a 3 season porch that are approximately 5 feet from the top of the bluff. Again all these were constructed before the bluff district was extended into this area so they are all legal non-conforming’s. The property also has numerous non- conforming retaining walls east of the house within the bluff but it meets other standards for it’s district. The applicant is proposing adding a boulder wall here. It would be between, primarily between 1 and 1 ½ feet in height. Potentially a little taller in this section by the 3 season porch as determined by the grades. They’re also proposing adding a stepper pathway. I believe it’s 18, approximately 18 inch in diameter steppers to 30 inch in diameter steppers and then they’re proposing to space them to allow for some infiltration between them. The purpose of this would be to allow safe transit of the back yard. The area in gray here is the area that would require the variance for that. They’re also proposing putting in a flagstone patio and seating area that is within the bluff setback area. The boulder retaining wall, their goal with it is to help prevent the migration of landscaping materials down the bluff during rain and also to provide some support for the top of the bluff up here. The flagstone as I mentioned would be safe transit through the rear yard. The patio, the applicant has stated that this area was previously covered by impervious surface from a pre-existing driveway and that the area has already been disturbed. In sum when you look over the landscaping plan it has been very thoughtfully designed to try to minimize the amount of impervious surface generated and try to protect the bluff. And the location of the home as we mentioned does pre-date the bluff protection ordinance and there is similar landscaping near the tops of the bluffs in the properties surrounding this one. When staff looked at it staff agrees that the flagstone stepper patio is needed to provide safe transit through the rear yard. Staff has walked the site. There is a, it drops off fairly quick and it you know due to the shade, etcetera it’s very hard to get vegetation to grow there. The applicant’s concern about it being slippery when wet certainly seems like it’d be substantial. The bluff protection ordinance does make allowances for paths to be located near and through bluffs to provide safe transit and we believe this is in line with the intent of that part of the ordinance. Staff’s review of the boulder assessment wall is that it will not negatively impact the bluff. The area has been previously disturbed. It will likely help prevent the migration of materials down slope although it’s a fairly minimal wall so it’s not expected to serve a major retaining function or anything like that. Regarding the front yard patio, staff feels that there are potential alternative locations where it could be placed. Staff also notes that the property has an existing rear yard deck and patio. A front stoop that could be extended to provide additional seating and ultimately does not feel the patio’s location meets the practical difficulties standards required for issuing a variance. Staff believes reasonable use can be gotten for the property without creating additional impervious surface within the bluff setback for that patio. Staff has worked pretty closely with the applicant at every phase of this project. They have routinely taken staff’s suggestions and Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 10 you know removed features that we felt were problematic and so we’d just like to point out that they have worked very, very hard to try to protect the bluff. Beyond that I would be happy to take any questions you may have. Aller: Any questions at this time? Commissioner Madsen. Madsen: When they add the stepper pavers will they need to bring in additional fill to smooth that out so that they’re flat to be able to use them or will they be able to do that without bringing in additional fill? Walters: My understanding from reading what the landscaper submitted was that their plan is just to basically set them in grade and not alter the grade. However I believe I see the landscaper in the audience so I’ll allow him to clarify that during their presentation. Madsen: Okay thank you. Aller: Commissioner Undestad. Undestad: The, all the drainage swales around the house on there, are those all required? Walters: No. That’s one of the things I was mentioning is they have gone above and beyond what we would typically expect of a residential homeowner in terms of trying to manage the water generated by it. They worked quite a bit with the Water Resources Coordinator to come up with this plan. I think this is the third or maybe even fourth iteration I’ve seen of it in terms of getting to the drainage swales designed and vegetated in a way that would be effective for the property. Undestad: Okay thank you. Aller: I’ll just add another question on the patio. Where it was disturbed before. Was it verified their property had been disturbed? There was hard cover on that location? Walters: So I took a couple avenues to look at that. I looked at, as near as I can tell the driveway was reconfigured a little bit after 2012. I looked at a pre 2012 survey and measured back based on the location of the existing retaining wall. I believe that with the possible exception of a very small edge of the driveway that patio area was not previously covered by surface. It doesn’t mean it wasn’t disturbed by landscaping and other things. I also looked at the 2016 aerial with the, what we call the plan of matrix overlaid which show pre-existing asphalt from I think it was 2006 and then kind of back counted that based on the number of trees I could observe and if you look at my laser pointer what I saw was that the edge of the driveway kind of did this but never came quite as far northeast as the proposed patio. From those two sources it’s my belief that the section of the patio in purple here was not previously covered by asphalt. Again this isn’t to say it wasn’t disturbed by other landscaping. Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 11 Aller: And this square footage of hard cover, how does that compare with the square footage that is typically allotted? Walters: The applicant would be, even if the Planning Commission granted all variances they’d be adding approximately another 900 square feet. I believe it puts them at about 17.6 percent out of 25. They would still be well under the theoretical maximum for their district. Aller: Thank you. Commissioner Tietz. Tietz: MacKenzie it looks like on the photos it looks like there’s a downspout that’s being directed directly to the slope. Is that going to be picked up in one of the future holding areas up on top or is that going to, or is that part of the ultimate plan? Walters: I don’t believe that’s the final position. I’ll allow the landscaper to speak to that. My understanding from discussions with Vanessa and them was that the intent was that there not be channelizing, certainly nothing pointing you know towards the bluff. But I’ll allow them to clarify. Tietz: Okay, thanks. Aller: Any additional questions of staff? Hearing none if the applicant would like to come forward that would be great. Those who are appearing in a representational capacity please state that capacity when they are going to speak and we’d love your names and addresses for the record. Matt Arens: Hi, Matt Arens at the address 7644 South Shore Drive. My wife Amanda Arens and then Tyler Wortz who can answer any of the technical questions because I’m sure I won’t know the answer to them. So I won’t spend a lot of time going over the two proposals that the, parts of the proposal that the staff had recommended. I would echo that we are incredibly grateful for the staff’s willingness to work with us. They made some suggestions that I think we were happy to take and I think actually improved the plan quite a bit so we’re grateful for their efforts on that. I think the one thing, I think the point of contention here with the patio, I went back and read our, I was surprised when the staff suggested that it not be approved. I went back and I read our proposal and after I read it quite frankly I thought I don’t think I’d approve it either. The way that we wrote it. We did not make a very good case for it and I will tell you the reason for that is I was so focused on the other two aspects of the plan and if you go back and read it that’s where I really, that’s where I really focused so maybe just a couple things that I would add to why we’re hoping that you would consider this. I think just a factual correction on my part. I don’t disagree with the assessment that the old driveway probably didn’t go into that 30 foot setback. I think it overlapped with part of where the patio is proposed but as I went and looked and it’s really hard to tell, if I could say definitively it was in that area I would tell you. I’m just not sure so that very well could be correct and it may not have applicability there so I Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 12 wanted to correct that because I think we stated specifically that it did go into that, into that area so that’s one point that I would certainly agree with. I could have done this a lot differently. What happened, a little bit of the history here that would have made this easier is we really enjoy this partnership with the staff because we bought this property and as you can tell, I mean this house is kind of dropped right on the edge there. We didn’t build it. We would have done a lot of things differently and we knew we were kind of taking on a headache when we bought it. My wife and I were, didn’t have kids at the time. We did a lot of the landscaping ourselves and we did a lot of things that we think really improved the property. Made a lot more friendly towards the lake. I put a lot of that in the report. I won’t repeat all of it. But one of the things that we did was we had a great partnership with the water resource expert for the city and Ms. Strong now but prior to that Mr. Jeffery and he came out and when we were doing things we would ask him if he’s come out and he was always very helpful in doing that. We had some work that we were doing and we told him we’re contemplating a remodel and an addition to the existing house and the initial plan, and you can see it from the pictures. I’m looking at page 8 on the report and I don’t know if it’s easier to see up here but on page 8 it’s got the overlay of the old, the circle driveway and then it’s got the new proposal where it shows the area in the bluff zone. So this is something that I really wish I would have emphasized in making our case because I think it’s critical and hopefully it will make a difference. Our initial plan for the house, if you look back just inside that 20 foot bluff impact zone across the back of the property, more in the area where the smaller retaining wall is being proposed, our initial plan extended the house along that same line so the code is, allows on parcels of land where a building has already been constructed. The setback from the top of the bluff is 5 feet or the existing setback whichever is more for additions onto existing buildings so we could have extended the existing line all the way to the 10 foot setback and that was our initial plan. That was where we were going to add onto the house. Mr. Jeffery said I know you can do that but I would rather you didn’t. If you could change your plan to try to extend the house forward more towards the cul-de-sac that would have less of an impact and we’d really like for you to consider that and so we did. We actually had, we had the house drawn up. It was already to go on that initial plan that would have extended it along that area and we drew up new plans and really tried to find something that had less of an impact and what I wish I would have done, again I feel like you learn this stuff as you go through the process so by the time you figure it out you’re done with it and you’ve done things the way that you did but I wish at the time that we made that design change that I would have come to the staff at that point and said listen do you think this would have much less of an impact if we put this area in the front and change the design and I’ll get to why that’s more important than it might look on a piece of paper in a moment but, so that change was made and we took basically the addition and we pushed it out in front of the house. So if you drive by the property, and we’ve got one of my neighbors here who walks by frequently, what you’ll see is that new area where you can see the difference between the old house and the new house. It’s all garage so when you come into the house you just see this big garage and it’s quite frankly it’s not aesthetically great. So one of the things that we talked to with the landscaper was can you shift some of the attention away from this so it’s aesthetically, it’s got more curb appeal because it’s kind of a design flaw and the other thing that we talked about, and respectfully I don’t disagree with the staff. You know you can see there’s a little front stoop where you could sit but if you sit on that stoop you have to imagine Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 13 the wall of the new garage runs this way so if you look at here, you can see. You can’t even really, you can’t see the driveway from where you’re sitting there so it’s, we’ve got a 5 year old and a 7 year old child. You know they play in the driveway a lot and as you can see from the back yard from the pictures that property falls right off. I mean there’s no area for them to play and I don’t want to insult you folks by saying it’s going to be the end of the world if we don’t have a little area to sit there in the front but essentially the alternative is it’s pulling lawn chairs out and sitting in the driveway which is doable but you know there’s, this sitting area is more important I guess than it would look like on paper so one, it’s to try to as you come up to the house to try to turn the viewer’s eye and create a sitting area and a little bit of an interest but more importantly it gives you an area where you can sit and you can see from the viewpoint you can see the driveway and the kids riding their bikes and different things like that which someday we won’t need but for the next several years I think is really an important feature. I think one thing that I would point out that’s not part of the plan, and again I think this is because I was so focused on the other two items, we can make this material permeable. That’s correct isn’t it? Tyler Wortz: Yes. Matt Arens: So if that’s helpful we’re more than happy to do that. And I will tell you the other thing is the alternative is if we don’t do it in this area I think our only option would probably be to take out a couple of the mature trees that we planted 10 years ago and I would really rather not do that. I mean it’s doable but it’s certainly not optimal in my mind so I think there’s some tweaks that we can make to it that would make that a little more important. Again I apologize. There’s a different way we could have went about this which I think would have made our case stronger than we’ve made it but that’s, those are kind of some thoughts that I wanted to put forward on that aspect and I’m happy to answer any questions on that or the other parts of the plan as well. Aller: Any questions at this point of the applicant? I just have some questions for the landscaper. Otherwise thank you sir. So let’s talk about the permeability. Tyler Wortz: Yes. Aller: What’s that option? Your vision to be… Tyler Wortz: With the flagstone patio we could make it a permeable flagstone where the joints are free draining into our free draining base which then can infiltrate into the ground water. The more traditional way is to fill those joints with a poly metric sand that hardens and so then we’re sheeting water off of it but we could definitely turn it into a permeable system that allows it into the ground water without the sheeting. Aller: And the retaining walls. Could you talk about the retaining walls and what that would do to protect the lake? Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 14 Tyler Wortz: So the row of boulders in the back or the small retaining wall is, you know fieldstone boulders ranging in size from you know on the small end 12 to 18 inch diameter boulders. Probably on the upper end 25 to 28 inch boulders. Installed with not much disturbance to what’s already there. As you see in the pictures there’s a pretty clear defined drop off between the currently disturbed soils and then the fescue on the bluff. So what we’re looking for is just a defined separation between those two areas and to help us keep mulch and landscape materials from ending up on that beautiful fescue and slowing down water. One thing that we talked with Vanessa Strong quite a bit about is you know dispersing and slowing the rain water and so the intent isn’t to hold the rain water. That’s actually one of the original drafts of the plan was having rain gardens on top of the boulder wall and you know maybe a learning point on my end was working with Vanessa on how that’s not necessarily what we want at the top of a bluff and so, so we moved those swales into other portions of the property where we want water to soak in and that back boulder wall is just slowing the water. Matt Arens: If I could just one point to add to that. Aller: Yes. Matt Arens: Just a little history. So when we moved into this property there was a lot of just scrubby volunteers on that back area and so it was dirt transitioning to more dirt and one of the things I wish I would have done differently is I wish I would have videotaped when we’d get a hard rain because mud would wash right down the hill and into the lake and I think I mentioned that in the report. We have tried, so we planted, we planted, we got a recommendation and the City has been really complimentary of how this low growth fescue has gone in. It’s, you know it’s got a deep root system. It holds that hill incredibly well. The problem is you get the flatter area and then you get it to transition so we’ve tried putting mulch in there. It washes down the hill. We’ve tried putting all sorts of things and it’s just, we haven’t been able to find anything. And then the other thing is, there are certain areas where, I mean the old house and I think somebody had a question about where the rain water from the spouts went. There was a spout that came down and drained and it had some velocity and it dropped quite a bit and that area would wash out 3-4 feet and so we’d go and we’d try to smooth it over and we’d try to keep that bluff line kind of intact and so part of this is to, it’s not to build something up. It’s not to do anything. It’s just to anchor that so then we can have, and again this was, I give all the credit to the staff on this. We were going to put you know a yard surface in there and they said if you can do stepper stones that would give you what you’re looking for and to have that and to transition to that really effective fescue we think, we think makes a lot of sense. McGonagill: So then, if I can ask a question. That drain pipe will stop before the boulder wall and just distribute above the boulder wall? The one that was in the photo. Tyler Wortz: Yeah the drain pipes that you see in the photo are all temporary. We wouldn’t allow any of them to be running that closely to the bluff. That’s where all the vegetative swales on the plan throughout the property come into play. We’d be routing them more towards the Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 15 front where they can slow and disperse but we would not want any point sources of water aimed directly at the bluff like that. Aller: And then if you could just comment quickly on the flagstone. Tyler Wortz: The flagstone steppers. Yes to your question on, no we wouldn’t be bringing in any fill to install those. We’d be working on the native grade and just you know minor hand working to level them and set them into place but we’re not going to do any major disturbance to the existing grade and soil. Madsen: Thank you. Tyler Wortz: Yes. Aller: Additional questions at this time? Okay thank you very much. Tyler Wortz: Thank you. Aller: At this point in time I’ll open up the public hearing portion of this item. Any individuals wishing to speak for or against the item can do so at this time. Welcome sir. If you could state your name and address for the record that would be great. Curt Robinson: My name is Curt Robinson. I live at 202 West 77th Street. I really haven’t seen the property. I don’t really know all the technical issues you’re talking about. I take my grandson down fishing next door and I can tell you that Mr. Arens always keeps the property neat and I’m sure he will continue to do so. Thank you. Aller: Thank you sir. Any other individuals wishing to come forward at this time can do so. Seeing no one come forward I will close the public hearing portion of this item and open it up for discussion. Any bones, primarily my concern was going to be the patio and not necessarily because I don’t find it to be a reasonable use but because of the potential water issues and the hard cover issues but I think they’re resolved by the amount of the hard cover not exceeding about 17.5 percent. The fact that there’s been an offer to potentially do that with pervious pavers as well which is something that I would be in favor of doing and so I would be in favor of any motion which allows for this, these variances to be made with that modification based on the fact that clearly this applicant has made and gone well beyond, above and beyond in protecting the bluff and my concern is with the bluff and the water issues and for the fact that they’ve put in the swales. That they’re going to reduce the rate of the water flowing into the lake. That they’re protecting the slope which protects again the lake from having other sediments and particulates go into the lake. And the fact that I think everything has been the safety factor as well as the impact of having those pavers put in for the walkway and economically as well as environmentally. I just think that it’s a good thing for us to approve at this point in time. Commissioner Tietz. Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 16 Tietz: Chairman Aller. It’s an excellent example of citizens working with the staff and staff being very cooperative and offering suggestions and obviously the land owner has taken those suggestions to heart and worked with their landscape architect to come up with a reasonable plan. It’s a difficult site. This is looking at the photos and looking at the survey and the terrain it’s, I’m sure it’s been a challenge for all these years to work on it but it looks like you’ve come to a good solution and a good process. Aller: Additional comments, questions or concerns? I’ll entertain a motion. Madsen: So this would include the patio? Aller: We would need to make a modification. McGonagill: Yeah that’s what I was thinking. We’d have to modify this. Walters: All you would need to do if I may is just omit the denies and just so approve the variance for the construction of boulder wall, flagstone patio and flagstone stepper path and then add the condition that the flagstone patio be pervious pavers. And then I would alter the variance document in Findings accordingly. Madsen: Let me give it a stab. The Chanhassen Board of Appeals and Adjustments approves a variance for the construction of a boulder wall and flagstone stepper path, and the construction of a flagstone patio with pervious pavers subject to the conditions of approval and adopts the attached Findings of Fact and Decisions. Is that right? Tietz: Very nice. Aller: Sounds right. McGonagill: Well done. Randall: I’ll second that. Aller: Having a motion and a second, any further discussion? Tietz: Just a clarification. Aller: Commissioner Tietz. Tietz: It’s references pervious pavers and I think if you’re using flagstone you’ve got the drainage between the flagstone parcels but are they technically considered pervious pavers? Chanhassen Planning Commission – September 4, 2018 17 Walters: The landscaper will need to work with our Water Resources Coordinator to make sure that the design of the flagstone patio abstracts the first half inch of rain water and meets our specifications but I believe it should be doable and that they can come up with a solution between them. Tietz: I just don’t want somebody to be restricted by the terminology and now have to change the design to accommodate a brick type paver. Is that was, because I immediately jumped to a brick type paver in my mind after all of the discussions we’ve had about pervious pavers so. Just so it’d be clear. Aller: Thank you for that clarification. Well taken. Any further discussion or comment? Hearing none. Madsen moved, Randall seconded that the Chanhassen Board of Appeals and Adjustments approves a variance for the construction of a boulder wall and flagstone stepper path within the bluff setback and impact zone, and the construction of a flagstone patio within the bluff setback and impact zone with pervious pavers subject to the conditions of approval and adopts the attached Findings of Fact and Decisions: 1. The applicant must apply for and receive a zoning permit. 2. The survey should be updated and provided as part of the zoning permit application showing: a) the top of the bluff; b) 20-foot bluff impact zone; c) 30-foot bluff setback; d) proposed lot coverage; e) 15” storm pipe and the drainage and utility easement located over the pipe; f) scenic preservation/conservation easement; and, g) all proposed improvements. 3. Stairways and flagstone stepper walkways within the bluff setback zone may not exceed 4 feet in width. 4. There shall be a minimum of six inches of separation between the flagstones that comprise the flagstone paths and walkways. 5. The location and dimensions of the boulder wall and flagstone pathways shall substantially conform to those depicted in Exhibit A. 6. All exposed soil within the grading limits must either be covered with vegetation or, in areas where vegetation will not grow, a double-shredded hardwood mulch. 7. Soil infiltration improvements, either adding compost or air spading, shall be conducted within the project’s grading limits. 8. The proposed retaining wall on the east side of the property is within the drainage and utility easement. It should not be constructed over the pipe or infringe on the easement. 9. The existing retaining wall on the east side of the property is located within a drainage and utility easement and an encroachment agreement should be obtained and recorded for the wall. 10. Zoning permits are required for all proposed retaining walls under four feet in height and building permits are required for any proposed retaining wall over four feet in height.