Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

I now call to order the regular scheduled meeting of the board of zoning appeals. The August 26, 2025 meeting minutes on the agenda for approval.

Been properly moved and second that the meeters minute meeting minutes for the August 26 meeting be approved. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none. Those in favor of the motion show by raise of the right hand. We show five approval and two abstensions. Nancy and John. The motion is carried. The final orders the final orders have been circulated and they have been signed by the board members. Notice to the public, the time, the date, the place, and the agenda of this meeting was published as a legal notice on September the 2nd, 2025 in the Aken standard. Notice to contiguous property owners were male. Public notice publish public public notice signs were posted and board action was requested on or before September 2nd, 2025.

Notice of this meeting was sent on September 19th for posting in the city web page and to the city clerk for posting on the municipal building notice board at least 24 hours before this meeting. Agenda sheets were mailed or emailed to interested parties. As a reminder, it is unlawful for any person giving testimony to this board knowingly providing false information. And that's according to section 22-9 of the Aken Municipal Code. It states that each infraction is a civil offense with a penalty of up to 30 days in jail and or a fine of $1,9250. We move directly into new business. I call your attention to application 20 930 02. That's the various request. 26

26 9302 as a various request to permit a reduced front yard setback and reduce parking density on property located on Bolton Street and in zone GB to the city. Has this been properly posted? Uh, yes, Mr. Chairman, it has. Were there any inquiries that you wish to share with the board?

Um, the planning department did receive one inquiry require regarding the request from a neighboring property owner. Um, but there was no formal comment submitted in writing. They just requested a copy of the staff report. Thank you. Do you have a presentation for us?

Yes, sir. Uh the subject property located on Bolton Court Southeast is a 1.1 acre lot in a commercial business park area off East Pine Log Road. The property is zoned general business and undeveloped currently. Uh the request is for a variance to city of Aken zoning ordinance section 4.3.1 to permit an approximate 15 foot front yard setback as well as a variance to city of Aken zoning ordinance sections 4.5.1 to permit 30 off- streetet parking spaces for the construction of two new commercial buildings on the property. Pursuant to section 4.3.1 of the city zoning ordinance, structures on lots zoned general business must be set back from the front property line 30 ft. Pursuant to section 4.5.1 of the city's zoning ordinance, off- streetet parking standards require retail sales and service uses to provide one parking space for every 200 square square feet of retail space. approximately a one half of the proposed square footage of the the new structures could be dedicated to retail space totaling approximately 8,840 square ft. I do have two corrections to the staff report. Um the first is uh the staff report does note a request to permit a 10-ft setback. Um however the proposed setback request is actually 15t from the property line. So it is not 10 feet is 15 feet from the property line.

Say it again. What was that? 15. The request is actually for 15t from the property lane, not 10 ft. Yep.

Um the request is for a variance to of 10 feet to reduce an old minimum building line standard from 25 ft to 15t from the property line. Um, however, the 25- foot minimum building line standard was increased to 30 feet after the new zoning ordinance was adopted after the year 2000. Um, which means the request is actually for a 15t setback, not 10 ft. So, it is further away from the front property line than the staff report notes. Um this discrepancy in the minimum build line on the survey was never corrected neither when the property was reserveyed in 2006 nor when the applicant met with the city regarding the concept initially in April of the of this year. Um so basically the applicant designed the initial site plan under the assumption that the 25 foot build line was the correct build line um correct standard and the request was only for a variance of 10 feet not a variance of 15 feet. Now, the building on the struct excuse me, the building on the site hasn't changed anything relative. It's just that it's actually 15 ft from the property line, not 10 ft from the property line. So, that's just a clarification there. Um, there is one additional correction. Um, as we me as I mentioned before, off streetet parking standards require retail sales and service uses to provide one parking space for every 2,000 square feet of retail space. As I mentioned, approximately 1/ half of the proposed square footage of the um buildings could be dedicated to res retail space totaling approximately 8,840 ft. Meaning technically the required number of off- streetet parking spaces to be provided would be 45 spaces, not 23 as noted in the staff report. That was a miscalculation on my part. Um however um there was additional clarification provided by the applicant in in a um

packet that he received after before the meeting started. Um and they're basically showing 30 spaces total not 15. So um based on that they are asking for reduction from the calculated 45 spaces to 30 meaning a reduction of 15 spaces not 15 spaces total on the site. Um, in addition to that, the applicant has stated that the required number of parking spaces will not be necessary given the proposed use and storage component of the space. Um, information provided by the applicant about the request as well as an approximate site and floor plan are contained in exhibit A and B of your agenda packet. Um, as I mentioned, however though, this this site plan that was in the agenda packet here, this is initial submitt, um, has been updated, um, and provided to you at the time of the meeting. Um, this is that site plan here, and it now shows that 30 foot minimum build line correction. Apologize, it's a little hard to see here, but this number has been corrected to 30. Um, and they're showing 30 spaces here rather than 15. Um however this distance has not changed but it is 15 feet not 10. So just as a clarification it is 10 15 feet from the property line not 10 feet. This is a survey provided by the the applicant as well. Um just to illustrate that it was at one time two lots and then I believe in 2006 these were combined into the one lot there.

Um as depicted on the uh the zoning map attached as exhibit C. Adjacent properties are either zone general business um and primarily undeveloped or unincorporated. As you can see this Caldwell Court here is primarily unincorporated. Um, this was the property owner that that requested an application packet. Um, but they did not submit any formal comment. This site is undeveloped. It's basically a county property for retention, water retention. Undeveloped properties here. I believe there's a cell tower or something here, but relatively undeveloped. Most of the development is on this side and to the north um of the business park. Uh some variation does exist regarding the development of this commercial area. However, um development along Bolton Court is generally concentrated to the north as I mentioned um closer to Pine Log Road. The business park and consists of commercial buildings between 3200 square feet and 10,000 square feet in area generally built between 1990 and 2008. Um, in addition to that, several other structures along Bolton Court appear to be located in the required front yard setback and are considered legal non-conforming. Um, this is likely based on that old 25 foot standard from the previous zoning ordinance. Um, so again, some of these are about 25 foot from the from the property line. Um, but again would be considered legal non-conforming because they preate the current ordinance. Um, I'll go back to this photo here or rather image. Um, as as mentioned in the staff report, a pre-existing city of Aken maintained storm water utility line and easement is present on the rear of the subject property. It does um restrict development along the rear portion of the lot here and reduces the buildable area of the lot by approximately 2,100 square ft. Um, exhibit D in your agenda packet

contains photographs of the property taken by staff depicting the existing conditions of the property. This is just a photo of the lot. Um, and our notice. Um, this is looking northward just to illustrate. Um, again the sort of undeveloped nature of the surrounding properties, primarily vegetation. It's kind of looking south towards that Aken County property that's um storm water retention. Again, not much not much out there at the end of the court here. This is looking south towards the Aken County property. These are the two properties to the west. Um they are for sale it appears, but um again there's there's nothing on either of those sites. So it's primarily surrounded by um undeveloped property. This is the one property that is developed um again to the to the west and a bit north on on Bolton Court. Um general commercial use. I'm not sure if this is 25 ft from the property line, but it's probably pretty close. Um I think most of them don't meet that 30-foot setback on this this particular area. And this is just just looking northward um along Bolton Court there. There are some additional photographs provided by the the engineer in in your packet there. Um there's some some additional context um provided therein. Let's see here. Um the planning staff's evaluation of the request as well as the applicant's response to the required six variance criteria can be found starting at page two of your agenda packet. This concludes staff's presentation. If there are any questions, please let me know. Mr. Chairman, I had one question for the city. Um, just for my own clarification, the the additional um handout that we got for the neighborhood business uh

description, this is just referring to the older ordinance because this is not current because this is a general business zoning. This is just a reference to what the old standard was uh pre 2000. Correct. Correct. Yeah. It's just to provide context that that that's where that 25 foot build line originated from. It was previously zoned neighborhood business. The zoning ordinance changed and was, you know, readdopted um around 2000. Mhm.

So, the zoning switched from neighborhood business to general business. Certain things they came kept consistent, but they did increase that minimum build line from 25 foot to 30 foot as part of that readaption read of the zoning ordinance.

Thank you. If I understand m city, if I understand it based on the new drawing, uh the uh southerntherly set of buildings of five buildings is within the 30 foot setback. Looks like it's touching based on this drawing, but that's that's not that's one's okay. It's the northerly set of buildings. a strip. That's Yes, sir. That's correct. 15 ft applies.

Yes, sir. And I believe this is going to be phased also. So, um the applicant may be able to clarify a little bit more, but um yeah, it appears as though the it's just that that northern set of suites that is is encroaching into the the front yard setback. The other set of building or rather the building but other set of suites meets the setback standard current setback standard of 30 ft. Okay. Go ahead. Yeah. To the city. Just clarify on the general business in terms of the setback as it relates to parking spaces. Those spaces also have to be outside the 30-foot line as well.

Um I don't believe that is the case. Now typically there are landscaping requirements um that will be sort of in in that setback. Um, so typically parking spaces, you know, aren't gen I mean they can be in the front, but they're not generally. There are some additional landscaping requirements. Uh, but yeah, the the setback standard is is really just for structures for the building structure. Yeah. Yeah.

And and you may have said this uh to the city, you may have said this, but the change from 25 foot setback to 30 foot setback was in the zoning changes that took place in 2006. Um I believe it was a bit earlier than that. Um the property was reserveyed in 2006 but that wasn't noticed that that was an incorrect setback on the survey. Okay. Um but yeah I believe that change that in increase in the setback standard occurred around 99200. Okay. Yeah. And this park was developed even before then if I remember right back in the 80s presumably. Yeah. Most of it on there. Yeah. Okay. And these have these have remained undeveloped since that time

as far as I know. Yeah. I I noticed today that there were more off street parking rather than designated parking.

Yeah, that that appears to be somewhat of an issue. Um just generally as well in the city. Um so that's kind of why that that standard exists that at least there should providing some you know off- streetet parking. Um there was some concern from our um public safety, you know, if there was increase in on street parking, you know, whether or not they could get emergency response vehicles back there. Um but yeah um that's sort of why these standards are applied to at least theoretically apply um provide enough off streetet parking. Other questions from the board to the city. Thank you. Do we have the applicant present? Would you read yourself into the minutes, please? Your name and your address. My name is Robert Keenan. Uh, address

149 Pine Needle Road in Aken. Mr. Kenan, you you received a copy of the staff report. Do you wish to embellish the report or just respond to and from questions from the board?

Um, yeah, because it's going to require some discussion. you know, that that Max and I had. And I do have a kind of like a overview picture that kind of I think will help explain, you know, some of the stuff which I'm happy to briefly go over. Um it's actually a shows it's a 3D model that shows everything. Um please.

Okay. Um so I I am the the developer myself and my my partner. Um, and I'm the contractor that will build and we will own maintain ownership of the of the property as well as as far as getting tenants in and and that type of stuff. But, um, this is the the overview of what it looks like. Again, the retention pond here and here's the the parcel. And the the biggest thing of our problem here is this utility this city utility drainage pipe that makes all of this area back here 2,000 plus some square feet unbuildable. We can't, you know, build there. We have to stay away from it. Thus, that's what creates the the problem up here at this front corner. Um, as as Max explained, uh, on all of the plats, including this plat that's currently at the RMC office where we where I got this, this dotted line, although it's detailed over here, it says 25 foot. Uh, and he explained the difference that that changed, but it was never updated from what I was looking at. And so the the six criteria um I think are met uh as the civil engineer has has outlined. But um our intent is to build a mini office park of luxury upscale what we call flex space. Um it is a combination of you know office space and uh a component of storage space. So you'll have a pre you know pre-built turnkey

office space. Um and this is a pre-engineered metal building on a slab but with an upgraded more luxury type better looking than a standard you know metal building. Um so it's meant to be an attractive place to work. Um and it's meant again we look at the use case there's not really an asset class like this in Aken you know currently um it is not meant to be retail space so that we don't envision that this will be even though the general business you could allows retail um our uh our use that we're the tenants that we're looking at are going to be like a uh a kitchen bath design showroom. That would be like an appointment only type thing or uh an electrical or a plumbing contractor that would have a small office and that they could bring their you know truck and equipment in um you know for parking inside and the you know the rest would be storage space or whatever. but it will have an office and a ADA compliant bathroom, but again, not really meant to be to be retail. So, uh that's where we get into the uh this area back here, these of why we have to um slide this corner of the building towards the street, which creates the the issue because of this drainage thing right here. These are pre-engineered metal buildings, so they're twin twin buildings. And um we would like to do it without having to re-engineer a smaller building um for for this one here. Um but the the

problem comes about from this pipe underground back here. This building, which is phase one, meets all the requirements. It's within the setback. Did you have any comments from the fire department?

Um, we met, we did the the pre the city preconstruction meeting back in I think April or May. Um, and the fire chief was there. Um, it does not need to be sprinklered because it's under a square footage threshold that would require sprinklering. So, there was no mention of any issue. They said this type of structure is fine and permitted in this general general business uh use right

so uh it's really you know we it's really probably um a much more modern looking building than any of the the buildings on uh on Bolton here. Uh, Tilden, the civil engineer, does have some pictures that even though this corner um is closer. This essentially is all screened by trees. Um, so you don't even really see it. It's an end of the road culde-sac, so it's not a hightra, you know, volume area. Um but really our our problem to try and better the you know offer a product that people have interest in and and better the appearance on the street is really kind of problematic because of this city pipe back here that we can't do anything with. So, I hope this kind of shows a, you know, an idea of what we're trying to accomplish. Um, which is an attractive, you know, in, you know, tax producing entity for the city. Um, but I think it's an attractive in- demand asset from a commercial standpoint. Got a question, Mr. Chairman. Good. Good. Brandon,

Mr. Keenan, can you circle back to the prefab nature of these buildings and what would happen if you had to come in dimensionally different one one from the other? Um, well, again, we we want to keep it consistent. Um, so they are pre-engineered and we've already done them. So, uh,

pre-engineered versus prefab. I used the wrong term there, but yeah. Um, I guess only ask that is because you're looking for on the on the building that's going to be encroaching upon the 30-foot setback. I mean, are those arbitrary divisional lines you got there to get the square footage of 1781? Is that just how you you're going to divide it into five equal increments or that's how it comes or what?

Well, it to to make it, you know, fit, I think it's 200 some feet in length. Um, and so to make that fit, it gets divided up into, you know, the the five and it gives you, I think, 1,700 square feet total per unit. 325 square feet of that is office. um you know sheetrocked, heated and cooled floored space. But uh

I I guess my overall question is there is technically nothing to keep that from being a set of 200 feet, 60 feet or whatever the if you were to leave a module off of that. Correct or no? Um yeah, we would prefer not to do that. Oh, no. I I I I get that from an economic standpoint. I understand that part, but yeah, there's nothing from an engineering or a build thing that would prevent you from making that a four module unit on that side. Yeah, we would have to go back to the company and and have a new set of engineered, you know, drawings done. Um, yeah.

Can can you pull up the uh the overview again and and and show me the 30 parking spots that you have now said that you've come up with? Yeah. Now, this model here is not updated to really show that, but Okay. Tilden uh I think I have your um That's it. We will need you to read yourself into the minutes, sir. Yes, sir. Children Hildebrand with Hassen Hildbrand, 133 Greenville Street, Aken. Okay. Um,

yeah, we um subsequently updated the site plan. Um, this thing um the 30 spaces. Um, wow. The 30 spaces are shown on this updated plan. Two handicap spaces, and I won't count them out, but um there are we'll call them public stalls here that are numbered. And there are also um stalls that we call owner spaces because they are in front of a rollup door. um whoever the tenant may be can either open those spaces to the public or restrict that because it's in front of a rollup door and he's trying to get in or out. Um and I will note that inside uh inside the building, if you remember from the um from the 3D model that Mr. Keenan showed some some of the tenants he thinks and I guess we think would park their vehicles inside the inside the units. So there are and I labeled widths here because these are wider than the than normal 10t stalls just based on the fact that the rollup door is 12t wide. So, the total number of spaces here in front is 30 plus, and Max, I guess you'd have to make a ruling on that or the planning commissioner, whomever. Um, could any of those spaces inside the building be counted? With the spaces inside the building, it would be 40. Um, however, our variance request is for 30 that are shown outside.

So, hang on one second, Mr. Elder Brand. So to the city the how are these discretionary parking spots to be are they those legitimate spots that can be counted in the total that they're in front of a rollup door and are at the owner's discretion of well technically we're counting them but five days out of the week I'm gonna keep a work truck there so they really aren't usable public spots. How's the city going to treat that?

I'm not as familiar with that standard. Um, typically that comes into play when we, you know, do a site and and civil plan review. Um, just typically handled by another planner. But, um, yeah, it's my understanding that we would probably have to base the calculation on the the, you know, uncovered parking shown like as part of the the site layout. meaning the 30 would be this, you know, the number we would we would base that on the the 30 shown here.

I'm not 100% sure on that. Um, you know, there may be some flexibility in there. Um, but I think typically, you know, a typical site plan would would require, you know, the parking be demarcated on the site plan. Um, which I believe there's about 30 in this particular case. Want to be sure you understand the question. You I wasn't asking about these internal parking spots. I'm asking about the external ones that he's Oh, I'm sorry. So, hang on to Mr. Hillbrand. Do you of the 30, how many of those would be in front of a rollup door or would you consider discretionary versus permanent?

Uh 10. Okay. So, TW uh 20 and 10. Uh yes, that's correct. Okay. So it's those 10 20 would be standard spaces, 10 would be discretionary. I understand your point completely. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good question. I don't know if it if it outlines in the in the ordinance. It just requires a certain amount of parking space per use per square footage. Um so yeah, I mean if if if they're parking spaces, then you know they would count. Okay.

Yeah. And and I I have the owner here. I can't speak for the owner. I don't know whether he'd be willing to stripe those as a standard stall and and um have the tenant Well, of course, I guess that would be troublesome to have the tenant try to police the parking lot, but um so I guess they need to be left as discretionary spaces.

Okay. in part well sorry part of the problem that is created is again the concept of this is flex so under the GB you can have all sorts of different things you know restaurant retail you know uh the yoga studio type thing there's not one there there might be different ones we lease to so that's what makes it difficult and how do we classify the because if you look in the table for instance 4 point uh 4.5.1 office space requires a lot less than retail. So there there might be a retail thing in here. It's not likely. That's not our plan, but it could it fits in general business. So it's hard to figure out from the parking space because it's it's variable. The use can be variable. Well, I believe the calculation of 45 is based on half your half your space being retail. Do you see that being

we we don't and and even half of it is not correct. Um because if you look at like that model, you know, maybe a quarter of it is the finished office space and threearters of it is the the back storage area. So it's not if you look at it that way the calculation would produce you know less required spaces because it's not as much required for a what is what is at the bottom of that table um storage and

yeah I'd have to double check but yeah it would be probably considerably less um generally retail you know standard is going to be the the higher higher number of required off- streetet parking spaces. Um so yeah, it was it was a compromise in some sense um because our zoning ordinance doesn't really have this particular use present in its parking calculation. I I I I I guess the future confusion could arise when these 10 tenants are are originally brought in and you have this perfect mix of x amount of retail and x amount of service or small retail visibility. And then over time that mix changes or you want to change that mix and parking spots aren't available.

I mean that there's a a truth to that. But the thing is is that you know we as the as the owner operator of the development, you know, we have to if somebody comes along, we're we're not going to lease to somebody that doesn't meet the general business requirement. You know, you know, we can't do light industrial, for example, under general business. So, we're not No, but what happens if somebody comes in and two of your more service intensive showcase things phase out and two more, you know, an ice cream shop and, you know, more retail stuff comes in. What's what's going to govern?

I don't think you're going to be worried about parking spots. If the guy wants to rent the space, all of a sudden all of a sudden the ice cream guy's corner, you know, everybody's parking in the other guy's spots because his he's only got two allocated to him and right and he already started with a

understandable. You know, one thing that I've always wondered about when you look at that the whole top wedge that is unbuildable doesn't mean it's not parkable. So, we could have overflow parking, you know, up at that everything above that dotted line and the back property line. Um, and there's a good chunk of spaces that, you know, could go and even on the side of the the right building over there on the top of it essentially um could be overflow. Okay.

There's space there for that type of parking as opposed to having to go out on the street. It's not All right. I appreciate you going over that. Yeah. No more questions for me. If you'll bear with me, um I'll go through my little spiel here and um try to clarify a few other things. I know we got several issues here. Okay. Can you flip me back to the beginning? This is my IT guy here.

There we go. Um just to give you a little history. Um Mr. Coward, I think you remember some of this. U Mike Caldwell developed y

this um uh zoom out a little bit. It's um South Aken Business Park. He developed this is phase two of um two culde-sacs nearly identical. Um this in the city I'm not sure why this in the county maybe this came a little later and there was some reason maybe the city had adopted you know if you use our sewer and water you got to be in the city etc. Anyway, this up here was developed first with this detention pond as a standalone to serve this. Not sure why um Mike had the pipe put in at on an angle like this, but he he basically cut off the back of these lots which were already impacted by the culde-sac. So, it limited the building space here. Um, another another thing I don't know why Aken County agreed that they would own and maintain this detention pond. So, this is one little piece of Aken County in the city and Aken County owns and maintains that detention pond.

The retention, the retention pond is Aken County. It belongs to Aken County. Okay. The pipe is the city. Um the pipe anything from this point up to city um kind of convoluted city lift station right here pumps up there's sewer that goes out and of course main etc etc. Um let's flip um we'll come back um we'll come back to this one in just a second. Where do you want to go? Um all right this this is the next street up that was developed as phase one. Um this is Caldwell Court. Bolton Court is right back here.

Um if you look, most of these developments um meet the 30 or these buildings meet the a 30foot setback. At the time that they were developed, both streets had a 25 foot setback. Still shows up on the record plat. my fault for not catching it knowing that GB is 30 now, but we just went by the record plat when we when we drew Mr. Keenan's concept. Most of these businesses along Caldwell Court, and it'll be a little bit planer to see in a minute, have long paved frontages right to the back of the curb. Little bit of grass here. This is key chemicals. Um, let's flip one more, Bob. Um this is um WA Bragg over here. Long frontage of pavement. So in effect, no setback. I think um someone had mentioned, can you do parking stalls in the in the front setback? Yes, you can, but the city requires that you have a planting strip of 5% of the depth of the lot up to 25 ft. So, generally speaking, all new development has a green area in the front where a number of these, probably most of these over on the next street over don't. Let's flip one more. All right. This is WA Bragg over here. This is um some trees that are in front of a portion of WA Bragg. And the reason that I took this picture, and I'm sorry it doesn't show up all that well, this situation here is very similar to Mr. Kenan's situation in that you're looking at the end of the culde-sac and you have a wooded lot or a wooded area shielding

the last lot developed here. There's actually a business kind of tucked around these trees over here. Um there's a bunch of mini warehouses stuck on the end of the street. You can see those as you look down the street. And I'll tell I'll show you in a minute how this is similar to Mr. King. Where's the pond? The pond. Let's go back one. The pond is actually over here behind um Mr. Keenan's lot. Okay.

You can't see it in this photo. All right. Let's go up one more, Bob. Um, this is that building that's tucked around the corner behind those trees for WA Bragg. This would be similar to how Mr. Keenan's would look without all this pavement in front. He'd have a driveway that would go up between the buildings here. Um, you can't really see this building until you get right there to it. Um, very poor visibility. Uh let's go one more. Um this is um this is from that building that when we're looking out toward road trees that block view the view of this building. Let's I'm I'm getting to the end of this in just a second. This is Key Chemicals. Key Chemicals is it is at the end of the adjacent road. This is the cell tower that is adjacent to Mr. Keenan's lot, which is here. Key Chemicals lot backs up to Mr. Keenan's property. You can see that on Key Chemicals, everything is paved pretty much from property line to property line. And everything is paved all the way up to the curb of the street.

So, he's got parking lot. I'm not knocking Mr. Kee, bless his soul. He's he took advantage of everything he had here and he's paved the shoulders and everything. Um, which at the time was probably before the buffer requirement. It was and this was in the county. But this this is kind of to give you an an idea of what the neighborhood looks like. This is Mr. Keenan's lot back here. And Mr. Ogal Tree, the detention pond is right here. Okay. Okay. You'll see that better in just a sec.

All right. Let's turn that side. Okay, this is um this is the lot. This is Mr. Keenan's lot here. Cell tower on the lot. Heavily wooded, tons of trees here that as far as we know. There's no reason for the cell tower company to ever take those down.

Um it's been like this since the tower was done. I didn't look up and see when that was done, but it's been there a long time. These guys usually have a I don't know Karen you may know they usually have a 20-year lease, a 50-year lease, a long time. These cars are the cars or trucks that you see parked in the road. Um they are associated with the next business up, the Willis Kaiser truck shop. These guys these guys look like to me they park in the road so they can be in the shade. their parking lot. Their parking lot's fully open, sunny, not full. They just, I guess, like to park in the shade.

Me, too. Um, let's make sense. All right. This is the entrance to the cell tower. So, you see the next door neighbor here, and they, you know, pushed out a 15, 20 foot road to get to the cell tower.

I just wanted to show you that. Um, so you can see the neighborhood. So you can see that as you travel down the culde-sac, if Mr. Keenan gets his setback variance, you really won't see the building until you're around that wooded area to it. And also with the Let's go back to the to the plat to the layout. Oops. Sorry. Okay. Um, all the buildings on this road are on that and and Max, I think, um, we checked the buildings on this side, they were 29, 28. Um, just scale from the tax map, one of them is 25. his next door neighbor right here on the other side of the cell tower is right at the 25 foot setback. Um, but due to the bump out of the of Bolton Court and the culde-sac, those buildings would all be in line with this building if there's a 30ft set back 14t from the center line of the road to the pavement and then the additional 26 feet which pushes it back 26 feet due as a culde-sac. So, you know, all these buildings would line up. to clarify the 30 foot versus 25 foot minimum building or 30 foot minimum building line. We updated this to show this at 30 ft. Um the request was for um it's for

it was for 9 149 1496. Yes. And it was 5t less than that to start with because we mistakenly used the 25 foot set back from the original or from the recorded record plat. So that's where that that difference comes in. Um, we are right at right on the county's 20 foot utility easement here. No problem with this building. It meets the 30 foot building.

Are there any questions I could answer? I'm wondering about the sale tower. Okay. Is that is is is that is is that a problem? Not that I'm aware of. I'm there are no support wires on that cell tower that I recall. Um so I assume it's self-supporting. If it were to collapse, it's supposed to collapse down straight down. I I don't know whether that was that must have been approved in the county, Max. I I don't know that this

It's maintain It's maintained by the county, I think. I'm sorry. I said it's maintained by the county. The cell tower. Oh, is it? Yes. It's a repeater for the county. Okay. I didn't know that. Mr. chairman. When I drove out there, my concern was going to be the setback, but that wasn't my concern once I got there. My concern is the parking and um the the road was just full of cars. Yeah. Um and I said I pretended like I was a fire truck and I had to go around the uh Bolton Court culde-sac.

And it was not easy to do. I pretended like there were cars out there. But you said a little while ago you wouldn't point out the parking spots. I would like to see where the outdoor parking spots are that aren't in front of garage doors. And if you don't mind, and I was looking at that drawing there, and I I really can't see which of these are parking spots.

Okay, I'm gonna um I'm going to hit hit the spotlight on those. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18. Is that right? What are the big square look, not square, rectangular looking things out front that have diagonal? Yes. Yeah. All right. You see this little You see the red outline of the building and then there's a black line here. Yeah.

Those are the rollup doors. Those are 12 ft long. We um

Nancy, we have areas hatched out in front of those rollup doors so that the owners can access those doors. I guess it's debatable. We didn't We could use 9 foot stalls and probably add a space here and well that's that may be the and a space here which would make 20 unencumbered spots. Um, we were reluctant to put stalls in front of these doors because we didn't want to get into the, as I said previously, we we didn't want to get into the owner having to police spots in front of his rollup doors.

So, on the right hand, I'm not even looking on the left hand side. On the right hand side, there are 10 outdoor parking spots. Is that correct? Yeah, we two five six n I count sorry this one two three four five six seven eight nine. Now if if we don't count those as spots then that could be a spot. We only included the landscaped islands assuming that we had 10 in a row.

It's not real clear, Max. So each building there is going to have quote two outdoor parking spots per building. Oh, each unit. You mean unit? Each of the five units. Yes. Yeah. Yes.

Which if you look at the use table u or the parking table if it is a uh you need two spaces per or one space per employee I think. Uh yeah, a wholesale business like a lot of the businesses up the up the street. Uh one space for each two employees which you know changes the but we don't know exactly what it's you know what it's going to be since it's flexible. But we do have all of this space up here for overflow. you know, overflow parking.

Are you gonna have it graveled or how's that going to be clear that that's parking there? Um, probably like a pole with a parking sign. I can't I can't do anything on top of it because it's a it's an easement. So, I I can't I mean, I could put gravel there, but I can't, you know, put concrete or asphalt. An easement just means they could come in and start digging and doing whatever. Yeah. We had a friend's house built on an easement. Well, that's my concern is the parking because that road was hard to navigate when I drove down it today. Yesterday,

that road um is big enough. Obviously, the culde-sac 18-wheeler trucks that come down there go turn around in there every day. I mean, it's big enough for But that's not with people parking on the culde-sac. Yeah. I've never seen anyone park on the culde-sac, but um Well, if there's no parking for the building available, the closest space I'm going to park is in the culdesac. Um Max, can you go back to the tax map? There's parking in front of you here. Yeah. Um how do we get this on this screen? Can you get the tax map here? Yeah. Yeah. Um You mean like that? That one there? Yeah, like that one. I want to

Yeah. Yeah. Just want to show everybody the um Yeah, it should be on the projector. The business that that has the people parked in the street. Um I got a photo of it as well. You can kind of see. Yeah, these guys down here

um are in in front of um this they they come from this business and they park under this this tree and they park under this tree. And I've I've been out there, I think, three times now. I've never seen that lot full. Um, it appears to be some sort of truck repair shop.

It's not a repair shop. It's a It's a wholesale parts. They sell truck parts. They don't do repairs or anything. And of course these guys have this is Adam Supply. They have tons of parking and they probably they probably meet the retail requirement for parking.

Well, I was out there today. the gentleman uh spent probably at least an hour or so and I parked in the culac. I didn't want parked in the disturbed area. Um and uh just to walk over the area, try to make sense out of where that easement is and and so forth and the retention pond and that type of thing. And I do think that yeah that that unfortunately years ago that those two lots now one lot were encumbered by that drainage easement. So you lost a lot of 2,000 square ft of building space. Um while I was there was one black truck parked on on the street. Apparently, he worked at the Willis Kaiser Willis supply house there.

Um, there's another uh on the left looking looking uh north. It looked like a truck repair shop maybe there's the Adam Supply place and then there's another looked like a truck repair shop. I saw cars parked in there but not on street parking. The only place I saw on street parking is apparently what where the workers were in working at Kaiser Willis. I assume that

now when a tractor trailer rig came comes and it came today while I was there. He came down made his delivery also saw a UPS truck but the tractor trailer was a Southeastern. Uh he had to wait because I was in the culdeac. He had to wait and finally I saw him motioning me to move my vehicle. Get out the way. Get out of the way because that's his turn around. Okay.

Uh but he made his turn around and and everything was fine because that was the time I left. So I I I trying to I understand where you're coming from in flex space and maybe I'm taking up discussion time but when I saw flex space

and now that with your visual there uh frankly when I say retail um I I really can't envision much retail back there. I envision a a contractor like yourself, Mr. Ken that has maybe a an office and a showroom. Okay. I see maybe an industrial say a bed a small bed bath and beyond contractor in there showing having a showroom an office space with his all of his bathrooms and showers and that type of thing shown. But it's hard for me to imagine any quote retail space as I envision retail space back there because it's at the end of the end of the street

and it's you got to hunt. You got to know where you're going to find it. Yeah, you're exactly right. I didn't know Adam Supply was a a equin supply place until I walked into it. Right. I didn't even know they were back there. But anyway, that's just what I see is just I think what you're describing is flex, if you will. But not not retail. No, not retail in the sense I commend the Adams for being back there because you got to got to know where they are. I guess they do okay back there. But anyhow, just just my just for Well, I don't see any I don't see any impulse buying cuz you had to go find these business.

Hard for me to visualize any like you say impulse buying or people walking and window shopping. So just my my two cents worth.

Go back to your presentation and show the full [Applause] interior walls that you see. um will be constructed when a book look at the facility. The bathroom will already be there too. Is that right? It'll already be there'll be a walk-in door here with an office and a bathroom, right?

And these interior walls will already be here. It won't be you won't walk into a an X by Y, right? Open space and say, you know, what do you want to do? These will all be in place. Yes. Um I'm not a marketing expert. I don't see this setup lending itself to a to a retail business. But I'm I just draw plans. I don't really

the the interest we have is all from like a small contractor like a HBA HBAC contractor, plumbing and electrical contractor. Us personally we're doing a small design showroom which which is appointment only. So you're exactly right, Mr. Coward. It's not designed way down at the end of the culdevice to be retail. We don't envision that type of tenant. I mean, who needs driveby space. So again, this this asset class really doesn't exist in Aken. There's not another building like this, but we do have a good bit of interest in it.

Mr. Mr. Chairman, um I was going to hold my comments until later, but it might be better just to chime in now. Um full disclosure, I'm a commercial real estate broker. So, um looking at this product, I think it's really important to understand that, um the tenants are going to be seeking you out. They're coming specifically to look for this type of space. We do have a deficit in our market. We don't have flex space. Um I've actually been trying to talk to a lot of investors about doing this. So, I'm personally thrilled to see that it's coming. Um, anybody that I've worked with for tenant representation is not going to look for this space to open a store. It's not what it's set up for. Um, it's very, I think, purpose-built. Um, and I think it's what a lot of the subs and the contractors are looking for. Um, my question to you was going to be, do you have any current leases that you're already negotiating should this project come to fruition? because based on that market analysis right there, that's going to tell you who your tenants are going to be.

Um, one of the things that I tend to advise my clients on is always looking at your exit strategy as well. So, if the building and the market change, um, if you have a product that's going to grow and change with the market, parking has always been an issue on some of these older commercial buildings. Uh, great example is, um, the one on East Pine Log that is going to be a Sherman Williams building. um huge building, great building, no parking. Um great location. Um so I I do understand why why parking is a concern, but I think for this purpose-built project, it's very applicable because essentially you're going to have your office admin and you're going to have basically your technician in and out all day if there is a truck in place or you're going to have somebody that's doing site calls. they're in and out all day or you're going to have somebody that's coming to look at product, they're coming and going and they're going to be appointmentbased. So, I think it's really important to look at the context and based on what you're sharing and and you actually already answered my question because if you've got the interest, it sounds like your market's already telling you what it needs, which is what led you to this this project in the first place. Um, this property has also been for sale forever and I do know people that have looked at it and have tried and tried and tried to develop it for different uses and it didn't sell. And so I think there are a lot of things looking at it from a standpoint of when you say retail, that's not what this is. This is flex and flex is a very different animal. People are coming here specifically because they've made an appointment. They're not looking for you. Um, and I think with the prefab nature of it from, you know, a return on investment and understanding the the type of, you know, consumer or tenant that's going to be in there. Um, I think really it comes down to we're talking

about setbacks and parking. Um, based on the use, I I think it ticks the boxes. But I I would say that if you had people coming to look at it and they're like, "Well, it's the right size, but for this use, it doesn't have enough parking." you are going to hear that, right? But that's not who you're building for.

You're you're correct and I appreciate your your validation on the market analysis because that's exactly what we thought. I build residential homes, too, and remodel. And the same type of thing is is, you know, the argument of somebody wants to they're an older person and they want to take out their bathtub, you know, but they think, well, I maybe I shouldn't do that because of future, you know, somebody might want a bathtub when I try and sell this house in the future. You being a real estate agent probably, you know, know that. But the the the modern thing is,

you know, remodel it for the way you want to use it. Now, you know, somebody because there's no guarantee that you're not going to be able to sell it because you took a bathtub out because the next person just as equally may exactly want what's there and doesn't care if there's a bathtub. So, I understand what you're saying as far as the exit strategy. We our plan is to hold it long term as a commercial asset in our portfolio.

Sure. But I mean to the point of as the market changes, you may have somebody approach you and say, "We would like two units to put together." So if you have CCNRs or some sort of covenants and restrictions that says, "Okay, we can put two units together, you have to have these parking spaces, like those are things that you can kind of build into um your plan so that it appeases the concern for lack of parking because there are going to be people that they I would imagine would say, well, we want two of them. They're going to suit, you know, our business." So um I just kind of wanted to make that comment because you sort of answered my question at the same time. validates what we thought about this market.

Okay, children, would you uh say hello to my neighbor? I'll do that. He told me to tell you that. Okay, thank you. Do we have other others to speak to the various requests?

Hi, my name is Stacy Key and I'm the owner of the property behind um at Key Chemicals behind there. And um the question I have would be about that potent. Are you planning to do that parking behind the building? Because I mean that would be um like my concern would be with the the parking between like there are no trees. The picture showed pretty trees between us and there aren't any. But I I don't necessarily want there to be like a easy, you know, like will there be an easy cut through, you know, connecting the because we've had that problem before with Bentley's and people from that Kaiser wheel place and they would get stuck, you know, in the mud and different things like that. So

yeah, driving through like cutting through. I didn't know if you had that in the plan would be but otherwise I have no you know everything looks great. Um we don't have do you have a well we don't have a site plan I don't think now do we you have that in your packet? There we go. Yeah. Thank you. The city has a um planting strip requirement all the way across here. So that will have plantings there. It just doesn't show up on on this plan. Um so there won't be any there won't be any cross traffic.

Okay. We've got

sure there there will be a buffer here.

And I'll call. Do we have other others to speak to the various requests? Seeing hearing none, the chair would entertain a motion so we can enter a period of discussion.

Mr. Chairman, uh I would like to make a motion. Um, I'd like to make an a motion to approve the variance to section 4.3.1 of the city of Aken zoning ordinance to permit an approximate and please check me if I do this correctly 15 foot front yard building setback on property zone general business and generally located on Bolton Court Southeast TP at 122809001

to approve uh the variance to section 4.5.1 uh of the city of Aken zoning ordinance to permit no less than 30 off- streetet parking spaces on property zoned general business and generally located on Bolton Court Southeast 122809001 that the civil plans be consistent with the submitted site plan and that the final order shall be recorded at the Aken ROD office

second been properly moved and second that we approve the mer request. Do we have any discussion? I guess the only thing I'd add would be on the 30 spots. I guess I'm I would be okay with the 15 spot variance, but I just like to know that there's going to be 30 spots back there, usable public spots, right? I don't know how to

50. Go ahead. I mean, technically right now there's 18 on the drawing with the nebulous 12 others if you're parking in front of owners roll up doors and stuff like that. Is that is that a concern for anyone on the council that that how that's I mean if you had just two employees in each building, there's your 18 spots right there. much less anyone else driving in and wanting to uh come in. I that it's just a little Yeah.

I just think we're doing things a little loosey goosey on the parking. Yeah. If there's 30 definitive parking spots and we're granting a waiver for the 15, I'm okay with that. Okay. Well, that's been my concern all along. But the way I'm looking at it now is If people think that there's not going to be enough parking, they won't rent it. If and it'll tell him what he needs to do. Or if customers can't come because there's no parking, then they'll have to try and figure out what they need to do. do.

Well, it's my understanding, unless I'm misunderstanding it, that they're they're going to be designated parking, but the tenant is going to be able to determine whether it's a tenant parking spot or if it's utilized for a customer. That was kind of my interpretation that the 30 parking spaces will physically exist, but it's up to the tenant to determine whether that's an employee spot or dependent on the nature of the business. that I mean that was my interpretation when there's 15 or 30

when I'm sorry well the they're still allotting space for parking I think the plans are just essentially showing that this is an option for the tenant to utilize their work truck versus like I mean really they would be marketed in the sense that there is parking and that if the tenant chooses to have their work truck take that spot they could But there's still I mean I'm still interpreting it that that's all still going to be designated as parking. Yeah. I was trying to get a number to go into the motion. Um you said 30. I think I said 30. Yeah, I said 30. She said 30. Said 30. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. 30. Okay. Um

Yeah. Because I think if we start getting into language in the variance of tenant versus customer per. I don't I don't know if that's really in our purvey. So So to the city, Max, they're presenting 30 spots here. Are we we're going to treat it as 30 spots. We don't we're not really going to delve into the define the these 12 other spots that are determined use by the prospective owner. I mean, there are certain design standards for the parking spots. Typically, that's going to be like a width um or a depth. Um but yeah, I mean, whether or not they're discretionary as to if they're employee designated or designated the public, I don't think the the ordinance

the city's going to treat this as 30 parking spots, correct? That's my understanding. Yeah, based on the submitted site plan. Okay. Okay. with 30 with the 30 spots. We got 30. We got 30 on the plan.

We got 30 on the plan. Period. Uh that's what the motion says. Uh whether an employee walks there, drives there, whatever. I think I think it can be as the use as the buildings are occupied as the the each section is occupied it would I I think it would work itself out and the tenants would just have to uh as I say down the road work work things out that uh and whether it's an employee whether it's for the truck or whatever ever. I don't know how we can sit there and say, "Well, that it's going to be 12 and 18. 30 is platted or 30 is shown on the drawing." At 30 it is. And how it shakes out, whether there's a truck there or a uh privately owned vehicle there. Uh if if if somebody parks in front of a rollup door, uh then maybe the tenant has to say this is what you you have to um you might have to move your car so I can get my truck out, but maybe not not or just park your truck outside the building and somebody the the POV finds another spot to park in. And and to that point, as far as typically in the lease structure, that's going to be stipulated as the owner or the landlord manages that there's there's going to be criteria to say um you know, like I said, CCNR is like almost is what you would have um restrictions on the flex office, flex park um to say that, you know, these are

our restrictions so that they can manage it, you know, along with their common area maintenance. There's going to be rules and regulations that I think will be um policed, if you will, by the the owner, landlord, and I mean, based on the detail and thoughtfulness and attractiveness of the park, there's going to be a standard that I feel is going to be maintained. And I don't I just don't think that we could necessarily rule on that because it sort of steps into the management of the leasing structure. That's just my observation of it. Well, If we're accepting this plat here, does this show 30 spots? I see 18 with ordered space that we're assuming is to be used for parking. We should be at least approving a plat that's got 30 spots on it.

Does it have to go to engineering max because they're just asking for the the variance and then it has another step, correct? Or no? Yeah, I mean this would still require full site and civil review from us. So I mean theoretically they could configure the parking differently and some of that could be you know included in I guess this space here provided it's you know um pvious surface like gravel or something. So they could potentially accommodate some of that parking requirement here. Um as long as they're not getting into the the buffers. I mean this is just based on the number that was submitted with this site plan. So, I mean, it could theoretically change, but it would need to go through site and civil review.

So, we're essentially saying that in the approval of the variance because we're we're saying we're saying the site plan's great. Now, the civil plans have to follow and it has to show that there's this allotted parking. Correct. Yeah. I mean, again, you could condition it however however you want. Um, again, typically I'll I'll put that condition in there saying that, you know, once they submit sight and civils that it's consistent with with the approved plan, and that's kind of what this says. That's how I was reading it. Okay. I mean, I don't know if that helps your point. Well, I mean, we're we're approving a motion with for a a plan that's set up like this that's got 30 parking spots, right?

I'm okay with that. And I'm assuming the city Max uh sees it to fruition to to satisfaction. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I mean, as long as that's that's not showing me 30. That's showing me 18 and we got this striped area that, you know, there there's there spots that the guy will let you park, you know, that's little loosey goosey, but the approval is 30 and I'm fine with that as long as that's what comes off in the end. Yeah. Yeah. As long as that's the condition of of the the approval. Yeah, that would be okay. You know, I think we're ready required it prior to, you know, site plan approval.

Do we have any further discussion? Those in favor of the stated motion show by raise of the right hand. The motion is carried unanimously. With that, I call an end to the meeting of the board of zoning appeals. I think they're going to