September 8, 2006

EEHVS Task Force likely to present City Council with different scenarios

One meeting left to finish draft proposal

By Carol Rosen
Staff Writer

The Evergreen East Hills Visioning Task Force held its second to last meeting Aug. 30 to begin the process of summarizing its proposals. The final meeting is scheduled for Sept. 27 at City Hall.

Task force members were to bring two pieces of homework to the Aug. 30 meeting, not all of them complied. Members were to submit their land use proposals as well as prioritize the amenities they hope to see within the developments.

Laurel Prevetti, the deputy director of the city’s Planning Department, told members to come to the final meeting prepared to defend or promote their positions on land use. At that point, planning staff will take over to determine the final recommendations to the City Council in December.

“We will carry forward all recommendations,” said Prevetti.

She expects to provide the City Council with multiple suggestions.

“In my opinion, there will be different recommendations from the developers, from residents and neighborhood associations and from splinter groups,” Prevetti said. “We plan to present the City Council with all the thinking and all the viewpoints so they can carefully determine and decide on all the options available.”

Some task force members expressed concern that some areas are not clear. Even though some decisions are not yet resolved - such as schools - staff already has begun drafting the proposal. There are spaces in the document, which staff will add once these are determined. Each development site lists the location and size of the area, with space available to add the total number of residential units as well as commercial and/or industrial footage.

The draft also indicates that capacity for a yet-to-be-determined number of residential units will remain in a pool for allocation to the four properties.

“This capacity is held in a pool that may be allocated to any other property per the allocation criteria set forth in this policy,” the draft states. This property, according to the draft, is limited to residential development, and “does not allow for any additional residential development beyond these specific amounts.”

The draft also left the amount of square feet available for new commercial office and retail development to be filled in. Like residential development, commercial and retail will be held in a pool for allotment “to any other property per the allocation criteria set forth in this policy,” according to the draft. Any new development is limited to this pool or other non-residential development pools.

An unwritten section is available for an industrial development square footage pool.

The final section of this portion of the draft contains a policy for a non-residential trip pool. “The number of peak-hour afternoon trips generated by any proposed non-residential development will be evaluated and must be able to draw the required number of trips from this pool to be entitled,” according to the draft. Capacity from the pool comes from various uses that do not include residential but more cultural, institutional and public uses.

Transportation
One critical areas of task force discussion has been traffic. Evergreen’s major arteries, and some of its minor streets, are already clogged during morning and afternoon commutes. The draft indicates that there will be improvements for a number of intersections ensuring that the level of service corresponds to the city-standard D-level of service. However, the draft indicates some intersections will operate at E or F levels of service after full implementation.

The document also details that new development in Evergreen must include transportation demand management elements into the design to reduce demand for single-occupancy vehicles during peak commute hours.

It includes project transportation improvements that developers of the sites propose to fund. These “improvements are included in the traffic analysis and environmental review that forms the basis of the policies and standards set forth in the policy,” according to the draft. Funding for the improvements is provided through the financing agreement. It is a required component of the second phase of development.

- Operational improvements on Highway 101 between Highways 280 and 680 and Yerba Buena Road.

- Operational White Road improvements that propose widening White to six lanes south of Ocala Avenue to Quimby Road and from Stevens Lane to Aborn Road.

- Operational Reconfiguring Ocala between Capital Expressway and White Road—Ocala will be widened to four lanes between Capital Expressway on the west and White Road on the east.

- Operational Capitol Expressway improvements between Quimby Road and Highway 101;

- Operational Improvements to 14 intersections adding capacity and decreasing delay.

- Operational New traffic signals and modifications at high priority locations to reduce traffic delays; decrease the number of accidents or help pedestrians.

Yet another traffic area determined by the task force to be of importance is transportation mitigation improvements. Construction will be funded by site developers and by fees from a Traffic Impact Fee applied to all new residential pool allocations. The specific areas for mitigation are:

- Operational Capitol Expressway and Quimby Road adding north- and east bound turning lanes to the intersection

- Operational Nieman Boulevard and Yerba Buena Road adding a second westbound left turn lane; and

- Operational Tully Road and McLaughlin Avenue an exclusive northbound right turn lane.

Other transportation amenities include an Intelligent Transportation System Network, construction of sections of the Thompson Creek Trail, new bike lanes, transit system enhancements and traffic calming measures.

Amenities
The Planning Department asked each task force member to prioritize amenities into four different categories; must have, important, nice to have and other. The must-have amenities are to be fully funded. Once ranked, implementation of the four areas can vary based on funding availability and other factors. All must have amenities have to be fully funded before funds are allocated to an amenity in less important tiers.

Any amenity development is subject to provisions of the Parklands Dedication Ordinance and Park Impact Ordinance. According to the draft, “Implementation of the PDO/PIO will be used to provide parklands in addition to the specific improvements identified on the Amenity List in this Policy or to provide an additional funding source to allow construction of additional items on the Amenity List.”