Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

All right, everyone. Welcome to the Planning Commission meeting on 05/28/2025. We'll start with the flag salute. Ready to begin. Thank you everyone.

So today is a study session. The purpose of the study session is to learn about a topic, ask questions, and provide general feedback to staff. No votes or action will be taken at this time. This is not a public hearing but if you would like to speak on a study session item please limit comments to three minutes. Do we have any request for public comment?

I have none at this time.

Great. Thank you. Alright. So I will introduce the study session item. There's a very long introduction.

I'll leave most of that to staff to cover, but the study session is on 16300 Euclid Street, the northeast corner of you Euclid Street at Heil. The project proposes to construct a residential community with a variety of limiting living accommodations, including 304 for rent market rate apartments, 83 for rent senior affordable apartments, 82 affordable and one manager unit, a 183 for sale townhomes, and 36 for sale triplexes for a total of 606 units on the existing 18.09 acre lot located at 16300 Euclid Street. Great. And I will invite Jackie Touch. Hopefully, I got that right for public comment.

Yes. Thank you. Can you hear me? Yes. Hello?

Yes. Please go ahead.

Oh, okay. Thank you so much. My name is Jackie Touch and I live on Mount Dunhaven Street, which is immediately adjacent to the proposed development. Thank you for providing me the opportunity to comment during this session. An area of great concern to me and many of my neighbors is the impact on traffic, especially on Heil, New Hope, and the residential areas off Heil.

Los Amigos High School on the corner of New Hope and Heil is located within one half mile of this proposed development, which is anticipated to result in an estimated 3,228 daily trips from four total driveways, three of which exit onto Heil. The intersection of Newhelp Street and Warner is currently operating at a level of service e during the PM rush hour, which does not meet the county's minimum standard of level of service d, and this impacts the area near the high school. This is easily seen in the poor family whose concrete wall has been broken several times in the past several years that I've lived here, as well as the floral memorial that's at that corner. That's a daily reminder that a child recently lost their life at that intersection. Per the Orange County Transportation implemention implementation manual updated in September 2021, quote, within three years of the issuance of the first use and occupancy permit for a development project or within five years of the issuance of a finished grading permit or building permit for said project, whichever occurs first, all necessary improvements to the highway system within the county's jurisdiction to which the project contributes measurable traffic shall be constructed and completed to attain level of service D or better.

The study session for the Boomers' property addressed Driveway A at Magnolia, which would be found to operate at a level of service F, and described the mitigating factor of installing a signal in coordination with Caltrans, which would then make it a level of service A. The developer also proposed an alternate plan in the event that the was not approved. I see no discussion from the developer or the city about how the level of service e on New Hope And Warner is going to be addressed. I also see no discussion of what type of mitigating factors will be initiated to minimize the impact of increased traffic on the side streets of Heil, especially Sugarloaf and Ivory, from the estimated 3,228 daily trips that migrate into the residential areas to find a way to circumvent the intersection of Euclid and Heil and the entrance and exit to the apartment parking structure. The project website shows it is going to remain a single lane ending in a single left turn and single right turn lane going westbound and a single lane going eastbound between Euclid and Mount Dunhaven.

These residential streets are utilized by schoolchildren from Los Amigos High, Monroe Elementary, and Northcutt Elementary, and the increased traffic poses a safety hazard. As You

got ten seconds left.

Already impacted by the level of service e at the intersection of New Hope and Warner. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Any other requests for comment? Great. I'll invite staff to make their presentation. Yes, sir.

Just some introductory comments before mister Ayers speaks. I won't take away his slides from him this time, but thank you again for being This is your second study session in as many weeks. It will run similar to the last study session you had, which I believe was referenced as well. Steph will provide a presentation. Again, is more of a discussion.

So as we go through each slide, please feel free to ask questions and not wait towards the end. We like to have a free flowing conversation at some point. There may be a comment or a question that we have for the applicant as well that they can come up and ask per slide and we'll ask them to introduce themselves at that time as well. So it's more of a discussion, so please feel free. We also have a team here on our side that is here to support you and answer questions.

So was referenced was traffic and circulation. So we have a public works engineering team here that has been working with the applicant on that topic. We have our fire chief and deputy fire marshal here as well. And so hopefully between the team you have here on the city side, we'll be able to answer most of your questions beyond what the applicant can assist with as well. So I'll turn it over to mister Ayers and we'll walk through the project and kind of take a look at it.

Well, you. Like Omar said, we're gonna take a look at this project at 16300 Euclid Street. Before we get Before I get into the project, just a little history. The housing element for the city was approved in October 2022. In the the housing element, there were nine opportunity sites identified to help the city reach the arena allocation of 4,839 units.

The proposed project site that we're looking at tonight was one of those opportunity sites. The site was rezoned to R 4 in December 2023, which allows 30 to one units per acre. The site is a former strawberry field. Operations of that strawberry field ended in 2021. And the project that we're looking at tonight was submitted in January 2024, and anticipated planning commission date is 06/25/2025.

So getting into the project. The project includes six zero six units broken down into three zero four market rate market rate apartment units, 83 senior affordable apartments, 183 townhomes, and 36 triplex units, all on an 18.09 acre site broken down in between 3.3 acres for the market rate apartments, 0.78 acres for the senior affordable units, and 14 acres for the townhomes and triplexes. So here's a vicinity map of the project and the area around it. To the Northeast, you have Monroe Elementary to the South, Northcutt Elementary, Wilson Meegles High School to the East. There's a middle school up New Hope Street and McFadden as well.

And then Miles Square Park to the West of the project site. So the market rate apartments, there's there'll be 304 market rate apartments, ninety eight ninety eight junior, one bedroom units, a hundred and twenty four one bedroom units, and eighty two two bedroom units. It'll be a five story wrap apartment building project located at southwest corner of the property. Five and a half level parking structure with 456 parking stalls. Building will be 56 feet 10 inches tall and 65 and a half feet to the top of the elevator tower.

It'll incorporate a contemporary architectural design and have three individually programmed courtyards, a pool oasis courtyard, game courtyard, and entertainment courtyard. Within the pool courtyard, there'll be a swimming pool, spa, outdoor barbecue, and outdoor seating. In the game courtyard, game long ping pong and pool table, lounge seating, seat wall with cushions, bar height counter, and shade trellis. And in the entertainment courtyard, there'll be a projection screen, movie, a yoga lawn, outdoor kitchen with a shade trellis and dining tables, and a beer garden seating type area with string lights. There'll also be coworking spaces and a fitness room within the market rate apartments.

So on the proposed site plan, the market rate apartments are located here circled in red or enclosed in red. So like I said, the south, southwestern portion of the whole project site. Here are some of the floor plans proposed for the, market rate apartments. On the top, you have one bedroom units. On the bottom, two bedroom units, and then there's one one bedroom unit as well on the bottom.

The elevations, this this is an elevation of the entire building, and I'll get to this in a second. But it's broken up between the market units and the senior apartment units, which from the outside look like it's one cohesive building. So on the top, you have the Euclid Street elevation where you can see all of just apartments. The east side of the building, in red, that's a market rate apartments. And then on the other side, the senior apartments.

On the south elevation, that's all the market rate apartments. And the north, in red are the market rate apartments. And here's some perspectives of the project. The top two taken from basically the same spot, Euclid and Hile Street. The bottom left from Miles Square Park looking at the project, and then the bottom right is along Hile at the southeastern portion of the apartment project.

So the senior affordable units, there'll be 83 units in total, but there'll be 82 affordable units and one manager unit. So that broken down will be seventy one one bedroom units and twelve two bedroom units. It'll be a four four story residential project on top of a ground level podium parking structure. We're located on the northeast corner of the Market Rate Apartments project on its property, and it will incorporate 63 parking spaces underneath their project area as well as some shared parking spaces with the market rate apartments. The building be 56 feet 10 inches tall, the same contemporary design as the market rate apartments.

It'll incorporate a courtyard, community space with outdoor community, lounge seating and outdoor barbecue and shade trellis area, dining tables with umbrellas and landscaping, and ancillary uses, property management and resident services office, mail and parcel room, bicycle room, central laundry facilities, and then additional residential services, including financial education, computer training, nutrition classes, health information awareness, and on-site food cultivation preparation. The senior apartment part of the project is just located on the North Northeast corner of that five story apartment building. So like I said before, it's on its own parcel. That portion of the building will be basically built to a zero property line as well as market rate apartments right next to it. And then there'll be on the ground level, you see the parking structure there.

There'll be reciprocal access through this this area, entering off of Euclid or entering off of, the North Side, straight through here.

Steven, if I may just add some comments here. So commissioners, if you saw this project earlier on and for the community as well, there have been a few changes as Stephen has kind of been going through the project. So initially, with the multifamily, the units the affordable units were interspersed with the market rate units. But as the applicant was going through and trying to get tax credits and coddle together the financing for the project, they realized that the affordable units need to be separated out. Otherwise, we normally have them integrated, which is what we're kind of used to.

So that's why they separated out into their own parcel now is for financing to be able to get the tax credits that they need to to help finance the project. So that was one change, but essentially the building will look similar or the same as what it was. It'll look as one building incorporated as one structure, but there will be a tiny little air gap between the affordable units and the market rate multifamily units.

So actually it's one No. Building it it's just Right.

It'll look like one, but it'll be separated just by small little gap.

And and is this is this really, like, then four buildings that we're looking at? Or is it I I guess I it's hard for me to tell from these perspectives. Looks like it's a long skinny building on the east side

and then how much One big

building. It's one big building with a parking structure located right here. So this is just the first level. If you go up, the building wraps around. You don't see the parking structure, obviously.

And then from that mile square yeah. Perspective Sorry. Then from that mile square perspective, you saw those courtyards that kind of break up the building on the Euclid side. And then we had initially that top on the top left, you have that access point onto Euclid. That was only gonna be for emergency access.

However, as we went through and looked at traffic and circulation and then when this change occurred, we were able to work with the applicant to open up that area for regular egress and ingress. And so now if you're living in those townhomes, condos or that senior project, you'd be able to exit out until Euclid directly, not go on to Heil. So that was a significant change that occurred over time as well. And then you'll see on the Steve and I were just talking about this earlier today. On the right side, you see those streets adjacent that dead end onto this project.

Initially, those were meant to connect through a future development, which at the time probably was conceived as R1 kind of single family that was similar to what is surrounding. Since it's not and we wanted to make sure that there were no impacts to surrounding neighborhood, this project would be fully enclosed. So historically, those streets were thought of being connected through this project. That is not occurring. We talked to the applicant and had that discussion early on about making this kind of self sufficient in parking and whatnot, so you don't want people parking in adjacent neighborhoods and walking through and being able to access their homes.

It would be entirely enclosed and not leading on to those other streets. So I think I covered all the general site plan issues we wanted I wanted to to walk you through that maybe changed over time that you hadn't seen.

Yeah. And I'll just add. At one point, we the applicant proposed trash pickup for the market rate where the apartments all the apartments in this location off of Hile. And we had we got back and forth with the applicant issues about trash pickup right off of Hile Street or Hile Avenue. And when things change with the affordable units up here, like Omar said, we had an opportunity to open this up and create a little bit more access to the site, And now trash trash pickup will be on-site on their property right in this location for for the apartments. And

then the designation, so for the low income apartments, it's seniors. I'm assuming that's gonna be a 55 plus community. Was that designation also part of the, you know, securing funding and and for tax purposes?

I believe it's 62 plus. Correct. And I don't believe it's necessary for tax credits. They thought that would be a good idea to have those types of residents. I think that parking ratio is a little bit lesser for those as well, so that really helps.

And these are some of the floor plans for the affordable units. So up here at the top are the one bedroom units, and then this is the floor plan for the two bedroom unit for the affordable units. And then the same elevation you saw before, the red enclosed areas are the senior affordable units. So as you can see, it looks like it's one cohesive building from the outside. No real change in architecture, colors, really anything.

Out of the townhomes, the proposed a 183 townhomes broken out between a hundred and sixty four three bedroom units and nineteen four bedroom units. These will all be three story structures grouped together in seven units, five units, and three units throughout the development. They're, like, located throughout the central portion of the project. Each unit will have two car garage. So there'll be 366 garage parking spaces as well as a 126 surface parking spaces, shared throughout the site, shared with the townhomes as well as the triplex units.

Each building will be 32 feet tall with a four foot parapet. They'll incorporate a contemporary architecture with stucco horizontal siding, metal awnings, and balcony railings, bronze colored windows. And there'll be a community pool and a pocket park within the development. So this is a general area of the townhome part of the project. The community pool located right here and the Pocket Park over on the side, the west side of the townhomes.

Just to point out as a land use issue, you could see that the bulk of the project, about 14 out of the 18 acres, is for the single family ownership units and four acres is for those multifamily. But because of the density that you can achieve with the multifamily, you get more units on that four acres than you do on the eight on the 14 acres.

Here's some of the floor plans of the townhome units. This is plan one, two car garage and an office area on the 1st Floor, great room and kitchen on the 2nd Floor, and all the bedrooms on the 3rd. Same thing with the plan number two, an office on the 1st, great room and kitchen on the 2nd Floor, and the bedrooms on the Top Floor. And then the plan three incorporates a bedroom on the Bottom Floor as well as the garage. Great room and kitchen on the 2nd Floor, and then three bedrooms on the Top Floor.

These are the this is the five plex version of the townhomes. They all are basically the same. There's one, three, five, and seven. This is just an example of the elevations proposed for these townhomes to incorporate horizontal siding, metal awnings, and the that same kind of contemporary architecture, as the apartment units. Here's some perspective views of the project.

The first one being the main entrance off of Euclid Street I'm sorry. Heil Heil Avenue. Looking at the townhomes in the main entrance. Second one on the bottom, the street elevation of the project, and then the third one being the pool courtyard area, and spa. So next, we'll look at the triplex portion of the project.

This will be 36 units broken up between twelve four bedroom units and twenty four five bedroom units. These will all be two story structures. And the idea here is to create some sort of with this project, to create the best version of a buffer between the project and the the homes to the to the North and the and the east. So all the homes in the North and east and to the South are single family homes are one are one zone. So the idea here is to create two story structures that match that as best possible.

And, Steven, I just had so the they're triplexes because the single family homes detached are not permitted in the R 4 because of the densities it's trying it's trying to see achieve. And so we looked at different ways of trying to get a look and feel that's very similar to the units that are surrounding on the north and the east. And the triplexes, I think you'll see do so. They're barely connected to each other on the entrance side, and then they look and feel almost like single family detached homes, but just connected on a on a little bit of it. So

They're located along the north and east border of the project. They'll have two car garages. So it'll be 72 garage spaces and then a 126 shared parking spaces with the townhome units. They'll all be 27 feet two inches tall, which which is consistent with the r one zone. And the r one zone actually allows you to go up to 30 feet, so it's a little shorter. They'll have 25 foot rear setback rear yards similar to the requirements of the r one zone. They'll incorporate a transitional modern and coastal modern architectural type. And then they will share the community pool and the pocket park with the townhome part of the project.

Excuse me. Omar?

Yes.

I just had a text from a resident who said the study session just went dark.

Okay. We'll look into

it. Thanks.

Should I wait?

So

this is a site plan of the project showing the location of the triplex units. Like Omar was saying, they they'd look and feel somewhat like a single family home, but they're just connected three three of them connected at each each pod. And this will kinda show you so this is the 1st Floor floor plan of each triplex building. So on the 1st Floor of each unit, you have a two car garage, great room, kitchen, and then some sort of working space and and entry to the building. So on this middle unit, the part that's connected to to this unit is just a working space and the entry.

And then same thing here, an entry and working space. On the 2nd Floor, see the roofs of that 1st Floor are connected, but the actual 2nd Floor is separated between each unit. So on the plan 4, you have four bedrooms up on top. The plan 5, you have four bedrooms on the 2nd Floor. But on the plan 5, you also have a bedroom on the Bottom Floor too.

And then you'll see here, there's a 25 foot rear setback to the rear property lines, which I'll I'll talk about in the landscape section. But there's a 15 foot rear yard on each property, and then there'll be a fence at that point. And then this last 10 feet will be made up of a landscape area that'll be maintained by the HOA. So you still have that 25 foot separation.

And for those listening, so it appears that there's some technical technical difficulties with the video on Zoom. The cable channel is working fine, so people can watch it there. And it is being recorded, so people can watch it at a later point.

Like I said before, there'll be a transitional modern and a coastal modern architecture type. This elevation is the coastal modern architecture type. Incorporates, some fiber cement siding, entrances with wood columns, and stucco stucco exteriors. And then these are the side elevations and the rear elevations of the project. And here's a perfect perspective view of, a street view of of the buildings, the triplex buildings.

Will there be parking on those streets?

Yes.

Both sides?

Best way to show it. So there'll be areas where there's street parking allowed on if you can kinda follow my cursor, but, street parking along here at the tip of the arrow, all along this side of the street, this side of the street.

So one side, not both?

One no. One side. This is a proposed phasing plan of the project. Phase one and two will be the teal and yellow areas, and then phase three and four, the purple and green areas of the project. So the entitlements requested for this project are an environmental analysis, precise plan, the tentative parcel map, and then the affordable housing agreement.

A quick question going back Yeah. Now two slides to the phasing. Maybe it's coming up, but do you have a schedule or or idea of how far apart the phases are supposed to be?

It's gonna be basically so for the yellow areas.

Hold on a second. So it looks like we have some the applicant here.

Yeah. The applicant's here.

Like, can you introduce yourself and you Sure.

Blair Ruffner with Shop Off Realty Investments for the applicant. So the yellow areas is going to be built by Lennar Homes. That's gonna be built over several several phases, probably 2026 through 02/2029. We're gonna be building the Shop Off's gonna be building the purple. That'll be about a two year build.

So it says let's see. Purple. That's phase phases three and four.

So the purple area is that's the multifamily building. That's the shop off intends to go vertical and develop that building, and that'll probably take about two years to build. We intend to start grading the site this October. Grading will take about three months, and then we intend to start going vertical on the purple area next April. And then thereafter, that'll be take about two years to build the multifamily building.

So is that how so is that all happening at the same time, or is the idea that you're gonna do

It's happening concurrently, different phasing. So Lennar and shop office adventure will deliver a graded pad, kind of a mass graded pad. And then we will shop off. We'll build the purple area for the multifamily building. And then Lennar will phase. They'll build the model areas up up front at the bottom right first, and then we'll sequence it from there between the years of 2026 through 2029.

Okay. So more or less, it's all I'm I guess I got caught by

the It's kinda happening concurrently. Okay. So we'll be developing the multifamily building. National Core will be building their senior affordable, and Lennar will also be building all the areas in the yellow and the blue, all all at the same time but at different intervals.

Okay. And so since they're not all one building in the yellow and blue areas that's gonna go in over time you've got the models. The purple you may have mentioned this already but there is a lot. When would you expect that?

We expect the

The rents to be

in construction on that next April time frame.

And then how long to complete? About two years. Okay.

Yeah. So 2028.

K. Thank you.

So first, the environmental. So the project will be processed with an addendum to the general plan EIR. The general plan was EIR encapsulated all development within the city, including this project. So they'll be preparing or they have prepared an addendum or the city has prepared an addendum, sorry, to the general plan EIR to cover this project, the environmental aspect of this project. An addendum to a certified ER is appropriate, whether some changes to are necessary to the previous certified EIR, but none of the conditions described in one five one six two section one five one six two of CEQUA calling for the preparation of subsequent EIR have occurred.

The project will have a less than significant impact or no changes or new information required in preparation of an EIR with application of the mitigation measures from the general plan update EIR. So this project will be required to meet certain mitigation measures measures of the general plan EIR, including mitigation to air quality, cultural resources, geology and soils, noise, and tribal cultural resources. Then there's the precise plan intended parcel map entitlements for the construction of 606 unit development and the subdivision of the 18.09 acre property. The precise plan will also lay out the location of the buildings as well as the landscaping on the properties. So market rate apartments will provide 24.6% of their site in landscaping.

The senior apartments, 15.3% of the site and landscaping, and the townhomes and triplexes, 15.8%. And the code requirement is minimum of 15%. The triplex privacy screening, kinda mentioned before, but there'll be a 25 foot rear setback for the triplex units, and 15 feet of that will be their their rear yard. And then there'll be a six foot tubular fence and then an additional 10 foot separation with ground cover and ficus trees that'll be maintained by the HOA. So all in in all, from the back of the triplex units to the rear property line for the single family, there'll be 25 feet of separation.

The ficus trees

We have a question.

Yeah. Did I hear you say ficus trees? Yes. Yikes. Okay. Thank you.

I got

a question real quick. So the rear 10 feet, who's going to have access to that? Just HOA? It's just going to be a fence, they're to chain lock it off, lock it up, and it's just going to be a 10 foot buffer? I

got a question. Do you have any exhibit from the side of line from the triple deck or even the townhome to the resident next to them?

We do. I don't believe I included it as a slide, but there there are perspective views for the two story units next to the single family, and then there's perspective views of the the other units as well. And the applicant did bring plans for for each of you. They're not the complete full set of plans, but they give you a very good idea of what the project is elevations and and probably the sidelines as well. So we'll give those to you at the end of the meeting.

It does sound like that'd be something that'd be helpful to include when the project is brought to planning commission for consideration? Yes. Thank you.

I was gonna say at at the time the ficus trees are planted, they're anticipated to be about eight feet tall, seven, eight feet tall. And within five years at full maturity, they'll be about 20 feet tall. So that'll help promote privacy between the development and the existing homes. And then there's a 100 foot setback requirement for single family to anything over two stories, and this project meets that requirement. So all the three story townhomes are a 100 feet or more distance away from the existing single family homes to the north, to the east, as well as to the south across Hyll Avenue.

Parking and traffic. So there'll be a 100 1,083 parking stalls provided within the entire development. 456 in the market rate apartments, 63 for the senior apartments, and 564 for the townhomes and triplexes. The state density bonus law parking requirement is only 817 or 818 parking stalls. So the project is providing 265 parking stalls in excess of the state density bonus law requirements.

And then sequel looked at the vehicle miles traveled, the VMT analysis, and the project is located within a low VMT generating area. So it was screened from a VMT analysis, a full VMT analysis.

Could you explain a little bit more about how that screening process works? Like, what that means?

I can, but I will probably botch it a little bit. I might ask our CEQUA consultant to come up and and speak to that. If

there's someone that can answer the question,

that's great.

If you could introduce yourself, please.

Hi. Charlene Selma, principal at Urban Crossroads. Sorry. Can you repeat the question? It was about VMT. Right?

Yeah. So Steven mentioned that there's a we're in a low VMT. Think we changed slides. Yeah. Back to back to slide.

Okay. So the city so for VMT, the city identifies three different screening criteria in which if you meet any one of the three screening criteria, your project would be deemed less insignificant from a vehicle miles traveled perspective, and so, therefore, you wouldn't have to provide any mitigation. So, the three screening criterias are based on transit priority area, like is your project located in an area that meets specific transit requirements. If it does, then you would screen out. This project didn't.

The second one is the project is in a low VMT screening low VMT area, meaning the VMT that's generated by the area in which this project lies on generates a VMT that's less than the city's threshold and therefore it's considered a low VMT area. Since this project is in a low VMT area, it met that criteria and therefore it met one of the city's screening criteria. The third screening criteria that the city has is project type screening and that's a trip based. That would be for any project that generates fewer than a 110 net new daily trips which this project generates more than that so it did not meet that screening criteria. But as I mentioned you only need to meet one of the three in order to be less insignificant.

So could you talk a little bit more about that second one? So what's the what's the screening area that you're talking about?

It it's specific to this project's zone. So meaning where this project lies within the city's traffic model. The VMT that's associated with that zone is considered low. And so therefore when you add

Is that like is that a really big area? Is that a kind of a small area?

No. It's the zone in which I I don't know. I don't have the zonal structure for what in which this project lies in to show you, but, I mean, we can provide that to you.

Yeah. I mean, just to get a sense, do know, is it is it, like,

all of Orange County? Is it No. Like, three blocks in the Valley?

Is it They're broken into, like, smaller, like, blocks. I wouldn't say, like, it's the whole street. It's, like, it could be, like, a corner. The parcel like, the the zone structure generally follows, like, parcel lines, but it's not, like, a single parcel. It could be several parcels in that one zone.

Okay. So it's a relatively small area?

Yes.

And so then just so I understand, does that mean then you could come in and build like literally anything there and it would screen out of the VMT process? Like you could put a

I don't know that it's necessary.

Like a stadium with a 100,000 No.

No. I I think

screens out?

I think there's limitations from that perspective, but the let's see. The prod the area in which the project lies in has a service population that is below percent below the city's average. And so as long as the project falls within that 15% and doesn't exceed the city's VMT threshold for that area, then you would fall and meet the criteria. So you're below the threshold.

Okay. So the screening takes into account the trips from the project?

Yes. Okay.

But it's not the same trips as, like, what the intersection operations analysis uses. It's a little bit different than that. Okay. That makes sense.

Yeah. I I think what people are trying to struggle with, and I kind of got this from the caller that had made the comment earlier Sure. Is this project sits against Euclid, which is a major arterial street in our city. And so I think there's a little bit of disconnect. And for myself as well is is how a project that's against such a major arterial street can be considered in a low VMT area because you do have now that one driveway that's gonna be, you know, ingress, egress onto Euclid. And I'm just having trouble kind of connecting the dots between, you know, such

a major

road? Because the two things are totally different. So vehicle miles traveled, what is now the state's criteria for identifying transportation impacts and mitigation measures, is totally different than what people have been traditionally used to seeing in terms of intersection operations. So for this particular project, VMT is done for the CEQUA side, but the city also required us to do intersection operations, which looks at the intersection delays and, you know, identifies what intersection improvements might be needed more than traditional what people are looking at when they think of, like, traffic and operations.

Okay. So it's a different metric that you're using?

Correct. Okay. It's totally different.

That that makes a lot more sense.

So just for for some background, historically, we for CEQA, we used to as was mentioned, we use level of service for those intersections. And then the state more than a few years ago now came back and said, you know what? We're not gonna use LOS anymore for CEQUA. We're gonna use vehicle miles traveled because it's a better indicator of the traffic. So if you have a mixed use project that would generate a lot of traffic, but that you may have people going and using uses within that mixed use center, then that shouldn't count against them and that's different things that the state wanted to accomplish.

And so for sequel purposes, we use VMTs. However, we still as a city require looking at level of service for our intersections to ensure that they are working properly. And so that's why we have both. I don't know if our traffic folks are here, Kyle or Tomo, if you want to weigh in on this discussion as well.

Mister chair and members of the Planning Commission, good evening. I'm Tamil Galves. I'm the deputy director of public works city engineer. And just to add to the discussion tonight, so as as our deputy city manager mentioned, we do require traffic study be conducted through the traditional methods, which is the level of service. And that looks at the things that most people are concerned about, existing traffic and what that looks like and traffic that would be applied from this project.

The VMT is a little bit different, and so there's you know, I've been doing this a little under thirty years, and and, you know, it it's sometimes it's a little it's not as as clear. But high level, what that looks at is there are certain regions. And so we we put together our own guidelines, and it was through extensive study based on what the legislation casted down. And so what that looks at is other things other than the traditional methods. So there are certain regions like this area here that when you put certain land uses, other things count as part of traffic traffic reduction.

So if a certain use in a certain area, there'll be things that that are implemented like elements that would have people work at home or the bus transit or, you know, bikeways. And so those things are also accounted for. But, ultimately, working with the developer, we ensured that both things were looked at, traditional traffic methods, which look at traffic capacity as well as these the VMT elements. So if that makes any sense, if that clarifies anything.

So in order to clear the CEQA, is that both of the VMT and the traditional study going to be met or they or either of them gonna meet, then you can clear the mitigation?

So the

so the v yes. The VMT is the one that we would be using for CEQA. We the city would be requiring the level of service and those thresholds to be met in order for the traffic study and its and any mitigation that's identified to to satisfy the study.

So, Timo, if you can and so I think the what commissioner Huber was talking about was how could a area that has euclid on it, that has so many cars traveling through it, be considered a low traffic area? I think that was the question from the community.

Yeah. Well, I think that was answered because it my question was more geared around toward, you know, reframing that perception against the metrics you're using to take these measurements. So I was equating the VMT with the level of service. Now I understand that they're two separate metrics that are looking at two separate things. So that cleared up from my perspective, and I'm just hoping that, you know, that clarity can kind of get communicated to the public as well so that when we're having these conversations, we understand what those different metrics are and how they come into play overall with how we're looking at the traffic and the flows for this project.

Absolutely. That's correct.

So just want to come back to this one. So if the VMT analysis is clear, it's a low VMT area, you don't need to do any mitigation for this area, even the level of services app?

So there are certain mitigation measures that are implemented, and I can have the traffic engineer for the developer speak to those that we've identified and working with them. But there are both VMT and the traditional traffic study can identify some of those elements and we'd ask that they address those through the study in those traffic.

Just real quick before we go, do we have

a comment from our council? You

can't live alone or not talk.

I'm not sure you're on a microphone though.

I don't know if I have one but we'll see if it works. City adopted and used this what we call the transportation Impact Assessment guidelines. So you have a technical document that the various experts, consultants, staff all used. I don't want anybody to think this is sort of a gut level analysis where you're plucking things out to decide what's low area, what's a low impact. So perhaps a little time with the transportation impact assessment guidelines can clear up a lot of how we got here.

To your point, Commissioner, different metrics. This lays out how the city responded to those changes in CEQA and that. So you you've got something tangible, somewhat obscure. You only usually see it in big things like this. So it's a bit unusual to run across, but we don't want any of the public to think this is a random review. It's actually very scientific, if you will.

Thank you. Go ahead.

Okay. So just really quickly, the guidelines that were just being referenced, regardless of the zonal structure, the city has taken the traffic model, and they actually have a map that's in those guidelines that identifies which areas of the city are, you know, below the city's 15% threshold between zero to 15% and then over the city's average. It's like a little colored map like this. And it's attached to the vehicle miles traveled analysis that was done for the study, and it clearly identifies the location of the project and identifies that it's in a colored area where it's designated as being below the city's at 15% below the city's average. What those types of areas mean when it's a low VMT area, it's basically indicating that uses in that area have generally good job and residential balance, meaning, because that's what vehicle miles traveled is, is how how far people have to travel to get to, you know, shopping uses, to get to work, things like that.

So these areas that have been identified as being below the city's average have a good mix of uses where people aren't having to travel very far distances to get to wherever they're trying to get to. And then separate from that, typically it's not identified as mitigation measures anymore because it's not CEQA. But for the level of service traffic study, we did evaluate several intersections around the immediate vicinity of the project and, you know, far south. There was only one deficient intersection under existing conditions. That's at New Hope And Warner.

That location was found deficient in the PM peak hour starting with existing conditions, it would continue to be deficient even after you added the project traffic. The city's guidelines identifies that if a project contributes traffic to a deficient intersection but does not change the volume to capacity ratio at that intersection by more than 3%, it's considered less significant, meaning you're not adding enough meaningful traffic to have a noticeable effect on the deficient intersection. And so the project has less than 3% contribution at that location, so there were no improvements identified at that one deficient intersection. However, although not deficient, the intersection of Euclid And Heil, which is adjacent to the project, it was not found to be deficient, but this project will be making several improvements to that intersection, including adding a second west bound left turn lane, a right turn pocket. So you'll have two lefts there, a right turn pocket.

They're making adjustments to signal heads, relocation replacement of the lights of the existing signal heads, replacement or relocation of several signages at the intersection, extension of red curbs at that intersection. And then they're also elongating the existing southbound left turn pocket from the existing 180 feet to 270 feet.

So you said there was a lot there. Good stuff, but a lot there. So where are they adding a second left turn lane?

So if you're coming down Heil to Euclid and you wanna go South Hill? Yes. And you wanna go south, there'll be two lefts there and a right turn so that you can go north on Euclid.

And so is there basically a wide median now there's room to do that?

They're they're gonna be widening the entire street and so along their frontage. So at the end of the day, you'll have those lanes at the intersection, and you'll have two lanes in each direction along Hile along the project frontage.

Is it accurate that the property is dedicating that lane is dedicating a portion of the property to increase the street width. Correct?

Yeah. There's a dedication of point five five acres. So right now, you kinda see it on this map, but the existing street ends about right here at the tip of my pointer, and the new right of way will be back here. At the intersection of Euclid and Heil, it jots back to where it will be. So if you take if you visit the site or you see the site or you know the site, at that intersection, the sidewalk or the the property line goes about right here, and then it comes out, and it's all dirt all the way down Heil.

So all that dirt area will be converted to City Street.

Is that Heil is dedicated by land?

I'm sorry?

Is that Ohio Street is a bike lane dedication?

I believe there'll be a bike lane.

Ruffner again with the shop off. There'll be dedicated bike lines up on both sides, five feet each way.

So sorry. Is there now or there will There

will be.

There will be, but what if what's there now?

Right. But this will be much improved upon. We'll we'll be spending about $1,500,000 on these median improvements and adding some landscaping and trees and curbs, let dedicated left hand turn lanes into the project. Should be solid improvements. So it'll be two lanes going each way as well. So instead of two lanes now it'll be four lanes.

Euclid is not the bike lane dedication, For Euclid, it's not the No, bike

don't believe so. Okay. Alright. Kind of already went over this, but there was a traffic impact analysis provided for the project. It looked at 10 intersections around the project site.

It all was also looked at unsignalized intersections to see if there was a traffic warrant traffic signal required. No no signals were were required from the study. Traffic generation from the whole project will be 3,228 daily trips with 300 236 peak hour trips and 264 peak hour trips. And this is a total of all the access points around the project. So, at each access point, they they broke that down also, by number of trips.

But at each access point, in and out, these are the peak peak number of trips. And then the parking structure for the Marquerade Apartments, there'll be gates at the south and north side of the parking structure that'll be open from 6AM to 10PM. And then the gates will be down and closed from 10PM to six 6AM, but they'll be accessible by the residents to to open as soon as they get to them. And then there'll be an internal gate as well as you go in. Sorry.

Let's use this one. As you go into the parking structure and you go left, it'll wrap around kind of this way clockwise. And as you go in and turn left, there'll be another gate further into the structure as you go up to the next level that'll be gated all the time, for the residents. So they'll use a fob to get up.

Is there a is there a dedicated left hand turn lane into the entrance? I I couldn't see it, but I'm sure.

Yes. I should pull up a I had to get back.

Okay. I think I saw it.

But, yeah, there is. As soon as you if you're going north on traveling north on Euclid and you turn right onto Hile, there'll be a dedicated left turn that goes into the parking structure.

Actually, out of curiosity too, so on the North side

Mhmm.

If they were to come in that way, can you still get all the way around the garage, or is that gonna be kinda sectioned off there?

From this driveway to entrance? So you can come in, and you can turn and come into the parking structure this way.

Okay. So it doesn't matter which driveway you use. It's No. Get the same area.

Yeah. And you also can get to all of the units from from this Driveway 2 or or these two entrances. So Driveway 1 is the main entrance to the parking structure off of Heil. It's a right in, a left in. So there's a right as you travel in.

There's a right turn in, a left turn in, and then a right turn out only. There's no left turn out to go east on Heil. At Driveway 2, which is up here at the north corner of the prop project, It's a right in, right out only. It's Street A, which is the main entrance of the townhomes and triplexes, full access right in, right out, left in, left out. And then there's also a secondary access off of Heil for the townhomes at Street B, which is right in, left in, but then a right out only, not a left out.

And finally, the DAPLIN has requested a density bonus pursuant to density bonus state density bonus law. The project will include, as I stated before, 82 deed restricted low income units, which is 15% of the base density. We've broken up between 23 extremely low, 18 very low, and 41 low income units. With that, they're allowed one concession and unlimited waivers to our code. They've requested a concession to the private open space requirements for market rate and senior apartments and waivers to height height of the market rate and senior apartments, site coverage, setbacks for the apartments, maximum number of units per, 1,435 square feet, which is in our code, a reduction of the minimum bedroom size, and then a reduction of the bedroom count ratio for the senior apartments.

Apartments.

Question? Yes. What's a wait a minute. Sounds like we have some audio problems. What's a concession and what's a waiver and what's the difference?

I I still I can't figure it out still. They're essentially very similar in nature. You can pretty much use a waiver for anything and that's what happens. And so the applicants, the developers in the city try to stick to the code as much as possible, but the system allows them to deviate for what the state would consider trying to get the affordable units in.

So when they're asking for a concession or a waiver, what's the ability of the city to say no to those versus not?

We don't really have an ability to say no.

I'll get to the next slide. So state density bonus law says the city must grant a waiver of reduction development standards that would preclude the construction of the project entitled to the benefits under state density bonus law unless the city finds the request waiver would have a specific adverse impact upon health, safety, or physical environment, which cannot be mitigated, would have an adverse impact on the property listed in the California Register of Historic Resources or that the waiver will be contrary to state or federal law. We've looked at each of these and and they don't they don't meet those requirements. So the the proposed waivers would result would not result in physical direct physical impact on the environment to the conflict with a regulation adopted for purpose of avoiding and mitigating environmental effect. The project would not have an adverse impact on the property listed in the California Register of Historical Resources, and the waivers would not be contrary to state or federal law.

Might help. A waiver

that's why you

only get the one waiver, is something that would prohibit the project. If you had a so if there is a standard you apply that would prohibit this entirely because because the state policy of housing, they get one, we don't want that. Take that away. Let this project go forward. Concessions are lovingly stated ways to save money.

Let's say you had a standard that every faucet's got to be solid gold. And they come in and go, we can go to Home Depot and get one for $20, save a lot of money, make the units more affordable. Those are the concessions. So waiver is without it, it's dead. Concessions are how can we save some money? Easiest way to think of it.

Actually, I think you confused them because they're allowed one concession in unlimited waivers.

Flip it around. Just

for clarity.

I wondered why he was looking at me.

I I might have been looking at you weird anyway.

Well, happens a lot.

So with that, that concludes my presentation. Open for questions. Applicant team is here. Representatives of each department are here if you have any other questions or comments.

In the traffic study, they say they have some evaluate about 10 location in the session. Do we have any traffic figure showing what is the queue and what is storage right now?

Yes. All of that is what's evaluated in the traffic analysis, which we'll provide for you for the hearing. So each of those intersections, the existing and existing counts and then the counts with the project were provided and evaluated.

Okay. Thanks.

Commissioners, other questions for either staff or the applicant?

I have a question. For the residents of the apartments, are they allowed to park anywhere in the back by the triplex, townhomes, park anywhere in the area? Are they only allowed to park in the parking structure and vice versa?

I believe I'll ask Blair to come up and speak to that.

Yes. So Blair Ruffner again with Shop Off Realty Investments, the applicant. So for the multifamily, it'll all be self contained. It's gonna be managed by Greystar, which is national institutional property management company. And so they will make sure that all those residents park within that contained parking structure, which is 6.5 levels high. And then also for the triplexes and the townhomes, that'll be all for the for sale component. And so they have their own parking spaces in the garages and also guests in assigned spaces.

So, Blair, will there be some sort of permit system or something in place for that? So say I'm visiting somebody in the apartment portion of it and I park in the townhome portion and I walk over, how was that controlled for?

Yes. So for the for sale side, it'll be controlled by the HOA. So they'll give out tickets, tow the car. They won't last long. We wanted to be diligent about self parking and having all the parking on-site. I know that's always a hot topic.

Thank you. While we're on that subject, do the surrounding neighbors already have parking per permits in place, if you know?

I think it's event event only. I think they do it for events at Miles Square Park. They limit it. Go ahead.

Yeah. That's correct. Yeah. So we and that's a good question. We we there there is permit parking, but it's only for the seasonal events like, Easter or some of the I I don't exactly remember the list, but there are certain annual seasonal events, and so they're they're permitted for those those Yeah. I think there's sometimes.

13 of those. Yeah. Is there any possibility of getting permit parking?

We have a the city council has a policy on permit parking. We can certainly look at that.

K.

Yeah. That might be another thing that'd be good to add to the discussion when this comes back. I think there'll be questions about that. Anybody else? Alright. Any other comments from staff? No, sir. Okay. Well, we will adjourn to the next planning commission meeting, which is scheduled for 06/11/2025. Thank you.