Planning Board - Regular Meeting

Ready?

Why do I always get the jacked up chair? I used to sit in that chair. It was jacked up when I sed up chair. Good afternoon. My name is Jason Grubs. I'm the chair of the city county planning board. Welcome to the April 9th meeting of the planning board. At this time, would you please stand and join us in the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America

and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Today's meeting is being broadcast live by Winston Salem TV digital media and will be rebroadcast at 10 o'clock Friday morning and again at 4:00 Sunday afternoon. Additionally, an on demand recording will be available on the city of Winston Salem's YouTube channel. Before we begin this afternoon, I'd like to recognize Winston Salem City Council member Joiner who's joined us today. Thank you for being here. Our first order of business today will be the consent agenda containing items for which the petitioner is requesting withdrawal or continuence or items for which the planning staff has recommended approval and no one is signed up to speak in opposition. For the public hearings today, each side will have a total of 12 minutes and there is no rebuttal period. Once the public hearing is closed and the board goes into work session, no one is permitted to speak unless a planning board member asks them a question. The items under section B of our agenda will require final action by the elected body, either the Winston Salem City Council or South County Board of Commissioners. As such, votes taken today are recommendations which are considered by the elected body during their review of the requests. For general use reszoning requests, the planning board must consider the full range of uses allowed in the zoning district being requested. Petitioner may not refer to a specific intended use of the property. For special use district zoning requests, the petitioner must identify the intended use or uses of the site and give specific details on how the site will be developed. If you're addressing the board today, before you begin your comments, please give us your name, address, and zip code for the record. Additionally, and this reminder applies to both staff and board members, as well as speakers from the floor, to ensure that our digital media systems properly capture your remarks, please make sure you're speaking directly into

the microphone when you're uh speaking today. First item on the consent agenda is the approval of the minutes for the March 12th meeting. Is there a motion? So moved. Motion by Mr. Steelman. Second. Second by Mr. Patinho. Any discussion? All those in favor sign of I. Any opposed? All right. I'm now going to call on Mr. Brian Wilson. He'll take us through the consent agenda.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and good evening, uh, members of the board. Our, uh, first item today is case B1. That's W3679. U petitioner was the estate of Carol Jean Faley. Uh, that was, uh, there 415 South Popppler. Uh, that case has been withdrawn. If you, I'm sorry. If you could just outside, please. And our next item is B6. That's case F-1669. This is the project iron spur data center. Uh they have requested an automatic continuence to the May 14th, 2026 meeting. Just for those uh who are in the audience or um watching from home, that uh hearing is going to be held at Winston Salem City Council chambers. And our next item is B2. That's case W3680. Petitioner is BBJ Properties LLC. There um is the site plan was Verdon Elliot Bomb uh 3617 Himmlot Drive. Requesting to reszone from RS7 to RS7s. It's a 0.40 acre site located on the east side of Himmlot Drive between Delaware Avenue and Sherbrook Drive. See the site is within an existing uh single family neighborhood. It's all zoned RS7. There are some commercial zoning here uh along uh North Glenn A uh as well. And this is the aerial. You can see it's largely um built out neighborhood. This slot does happen to be vacant. And this is the East Northeast Winston Salem area plan update ly's recommendation and it does recommend single family uh zoning or excuse me uses uh for the property

and this is the proposed site plan just to give you an idea of what we're uh looking at today. The petitioner is requesting all the underlying uses in the RS7 district. The purpose of the special use zoning is to consider the flag lot here highlighted in yellow. Um, for anyone wanting to know, flags are generally defined as having an appendage that meets the minimum access width requirements. In this case, it's 25 ft to access the bulk of the property to the rear, which uh generally meets all of the the district requirements for the setbacks and the size. This site happens to lie within GMA2 or growth management area 2, which is generally characterized by a traditional neighborhood grid street design with houses fronting along a public rideway. The intent of the GMA2 infill standards was to guarantee the general streetscape in those areas will be preserved. So again, uh the requirement for a flag lot is for a special use resoning for for flag lots to be approved. Um that's just to ensure compatibility. In staff's analysis, we did find that this would be generally compatible as this is a vacant lot and it wouldn't impact the streetscape. Therefore, uh the site plan does meet UD requirements and staff does recommend approval of this request and I'll be happy to answer any questions you might have.

Questions for staff? No one signed up to speak in opposition to this item. Is anyone here opposed to this recommendation? Seeing no one, I'll declare the public hearing closed. What's the pleasure of the board? I move the planning board find the request is consistent with a comprehensive plan. Motion by Mr. Lamb. Second. Second by Mr. Pino. Any discussion? All in favor sign of I. I. Any opposed? That's unanimous. Mr. Chairman, I further move the planning board recommend approval of W3680. Second motion by Mr. Lamb. Second by Mr. Tino. Any discussion? All in favor? Sign of I. I.

Any opposed? All right. All right, Mr. Chairman. And our next item B3, I believe that will go to a public hearing. And the same is true for item B4. That's W 3682. Uh that will move on to a public hearing. So we'll move right along to item B5. That's W3683. Petitioner is High Heat Marketing LLC and M Legacy Properties LLC. This is the Jerry Lansing Cottage Court. requesting a reszone from RS9 to RSQS. It's a 0.62 acre site located at the northwest corner of Jerry Street and Lancing Drive. You can see the existing uh single family uh neighborhood here. There is some general industrial zoning here and institutional public. And I'll I'll bring up the aerial in just a moment. You can see it's an established neighborhood. Has those existing uh land uses here. This happens to be some vacant property with that street frontage there. And this is the uh northeast suburban area plan uh recommendation for single family residential at a density of 0 to eight dwelling units per acre and this is the proposed site plan. Uh one of the purposes of the resoning request um uh twin homes are or duplexes are not allowed in the RS9 zoning district. So they need the RSQ district to allow for the duplexes as well as for the additional density. So the plan has a total of um 10 units. Four of those units are going to be single family. That's units 1 through four on the western side of the site. And then uh units 5A through 7B on those three other

buildings. Those are the uh the twin home units. They're all surrounding a centralized courtyard meeting the specific requirements for a cottage court. And then they'll all be accessed by an internal off- streetet uh parking area. Uh the parking area is going to provide some streetyard screening along Lancing Drive and uh against the uh neighboring property there with a single family house. I did want to point out uh something that uh we would like to add to the recommendation uh conditions uh recommended conditions. Um they utilized two different density bonus calculations to to arrive at the final density that they're proposing. One of those is already allowed by the use. The cottage court use allows a 25% density bonus. there's an additional separate 25% density bonus that they can ask for as a part uh part of affordable housing. Uh therefore, what we're asking for here is just to approve this with the condition you see before you. It's it's going to require the contract be in place prior to the issuance of building permit so we can ensure that that density is allowed. So with that, the site plan does meet all UDO requirements and staff does recommend approval of this request. I'd be happy to answer any questions that you might have. Questions for staff? All right. No one signed up to speak in opposition to this item. Is anyone here opposed to this recommendation?

Seeing no one, I declare the public hearing closed. What's the pleasure of the board? Mr. Chairman, I move the planning board find that the request is consistent with the comprehensive plan. Second. Motion by Mr. Lamb, second by Mr. Patinho. Any discussion? All in favor sign of I. I. Any opposed? Mr. Mr. Chairman, I further move the planning board recommend approval of W3683 with the additional recommended condition. Second motion by Mr. Lamb, second by Mr. Patinho to approve with the addition of the condition. Any discussion? All in favor signify. I. Any opposed? All right.

All right. And now we're moving to uh our last item on the consent agenda. That's C1 PBR 2026-04. This is the Barberene Court uh site plan for a 4unit cottage court in an RS9 zoning district. It's a 1.1 acre site located on the south side of Barber Jane Avenue across from Woodro Powell Drive and west of Galaxy Court. You can see it highlighted there in yellow. It's uh uh in a largely single family zoned area. There is an RM8S zone site just to the north and then institutional site there further to the west off of Barber Jane Avenue. And this is the proposed site plan. You can see the uh hopefully you can see the four units here. They're proposing uh again facing the centralized uh uh courtyard area. It's about 7,800 feet of courtyard space. Uh the units are going to be accessed via uh the um uh off streetet parking area here at the northern end of the site and then the remainder of the site is uh proposed to remain undeveloped. The site plan does meet all uh youth specific and UDO requirements and staff recommends approval of this request.

Move approval. Motion by Mr. Lamb. Second. Second by Mr. Patino. Any discussion? I would just like to say thank you to the folks involved with this project and the one before it for taking advantage of the opportunity for something so refreshing as cottage court. We appreciate it. All right. Any further discussion? All in favor sign of I. I. Any opposed? Mr. Mr. Chairman board, we'll now go back to uh case B3 and we'll hear from Ellie uh on that with the staff report and then we'll conduct the public hearing.

Well, uh that chairs, that one's too tiny. I can't see over the monitor. Sorry. Too short. All right.

All righty. Good afternoon, everybody. This is case W3681. The petitioner is FNCA Companies LLC. The site is approximately 11.17 acres located on the north side of Century Point Lane across from Guardian Court. The request is a special use district resoning from RS9 to RM8s. The site is located in GMA3 suburban neighborhoods. Uh the site is surrounded by multifamily zoning to the east, south, and west of the site, as well as the single family neighborhood to the east and north. The subject property is heavily wooded and primarily undeveloped besides an existing one-story single family home. The site gently slopes from the south to the north with the Salem Creek uh running along the northern property line. The site is located in the south suburban area plan update which recommends lowdensity attached residential uses for the site in recognition of the existing development pattern. This is looking east along Century Point Lane. The subject property is to the left. Uh looking west along Century Point Lane, the subject property is to the right. You can see the existing uh single family home in the background. Uh looking north from Century Point Lane into the subject property. Uh looking south from Century Point Lane. This is a new uh development, new construction, multif family uh apartments. So this is the site plan. Uh it illustrates the development of 81 town home units split among 15 buildings fronting along a new public street. Sidewalks are planned along one side of the street and the required type two buffer yard is shown adjacent to all single family zone properties. The plan shows common recreation area with a proposed community building. In addition, storm water will be managed through a single storm water management device that will be placed towards the northern end of the property. Lastly, uh

the uh site plan shows a 40ft greenway easement along the Salem Creek uh as recommended in the greenway plan update. The developer is also proposing a pedestrian connection to the future greenway from within the development. The site plan meets all UDL requirements. These are the proposed uh building elevations. In addition, they meet all uh use specific conditions as well. In summary, the request is consistent with the low density attached residential land use recommendations of the south suburban area plan update. The request is consistent with the general recommendations of forward 2045 to promote attached and housing and strategic areas. Lastly, the request would encourage a variety of housing types for different income levels, family sizes, and personal preferences in the serviceable land area. With that in mind, uh zoning meets all or zoning, uh staff recommends approval, and the safe plan meets all UDO requirements. Does the board have any questions?

How far away are we from the unit count being able to be built in the current zoning? How many units difference the I don't know an answer to that question as far as because I didn't do that math but of course they are proposing to do an attached product so they have to reszone to the multif family so I didn't run that math but as far as the overall project the project is 7.25 units per acre and of course the existing RS9 is single family and it allows 4.8 eight and change. So, they're they're adding about three more units to the acre. Okay. Roughly,

Mr. Lamb, just to answer your question, uh it's 54 units would be allowed under existing zoning. They're proposing 81. Thank you. All right. Prior to starting our first public hearing, as a reminder, each side has 12 minutes. Uh please begin your remarks with giving us your name, address, and zip code for the record, and make sure you're speaking into the microphone. Um, signed up in support we have Eric Dick Dickinson. I am not Eric Dickinson. Okay.

I'm Judy Stalder. My address is 801 North Lindsay Street and High Point 27262. Eric Dickinson is the developer and he's here to answer questions as well as Vince Townsen, our engineer. Okay. Um we um had several considerations when developing this plan. Overall, it was balancing the efficient use of the property with the surrounding community that's already there. Our primary consideration was transportation. Um this area is characterized by multifamily development. Much of it is more intense than what we're proposing. We actually started out with 110 town home units and as we talked to staff and looked at the property, we whittleled it down to 81 units. Um, the traffic generated by 81 town homes is actually less than the trips per day that would be generated by 54 single family homes for which it's zoned. Um the connection to Gyro Road was a real consideration. Um because of the significant grade change there, the connection is impractical, bordering on impossible. We did do engineer the drawings and um did the calculations and provided that information to staff um in support of this conclusion. Um, for density, we looked at town homes versus single family homes mainly because of the plan. Um, but also because um, we just wanted to efficiently use the land and town homes versus single family, we can get more housing per acre with less traffic and less land disturbance. Um, so the proposed density of 7.25 25 units per

acre is actually equal to or less than any of the multifamily developments out there. Um, of course, it's not less than the single family, but we're not connecting to any of the single family um developments. Um, storm water control is a technical issue. Um, storm water design must meet local, state, and federal guidelines and standards. Um, we because this is a special use resoning, we've already submitted our storm water design for review and it does meet the city's parameters before we can get any infrastructure or building permits. It does we do have to um submit the full storm management plan for review and approval by the technical review committee. Um just as important as traffic density and storm water control, providing space um and activity opportunities for our community is important to us. Um we are providing a community building at the end of our road. Um we're providing a centrallylo recreation area. That's of course required by the ordinance. Um, and there will be a sidewalk along that road that goes along the center of the development from Sentry Point and eventually will connect to the greenway along Salem Creek. that northern portion of the property beyond well including and beyond the transmission line um will remain undisturbed except for our storm water control device and wet pond and we'll provide that wooded area that that respit from um urban life um creek

protection and continue that wildlife corridor through the city. Um, in conclusion, of course, we looked at the highest and best use for this property. That's what we do. But you can see from this plan that we also considered the surrounding area and um the needs of our future residents. So, we ask for your uh favorable recommendation for this project. Thank you. Any questions? No. Thank you. All right. How much time's left? Eight minutes.

Eight minutes left uh for those speaking in favor of this recommendation. Is anyone else here that wishes to speak in support? All right. If not, then we'll shift to the opposition. I've got Dwayne Keith and Robert Roman signed up to speak. So, whichever you would like to come on up, make sure you give us your name, address, and zip code for the record, please. I'm doing good.

Dwayne Keith, 240 Gyro Drive, 27127. Um, my main opposition of this as it sits right now would be that primarily, even though they talked about the greenway, the green space, this takes one of the few wildlife corridors from Salem Creek towards Ardmore Road and south. Um we're already getting funneling of wildlife through our neighborhood along the um existing power line and that's we're seeing increased um wildlife impacts in that corridor already. Another um opposing point is that there is only one exit out of this entire neighborhood right now. I know they've done the DOT studies, but I've seen traveling Ardmore Road just about every day. I see numerous near hits on that sitting at the edge of a blind hill exit, increasing traffic already, not including the newly built several apartment houses that were apartment complexes that have been recently started. And even though there's a storm water plan at this point, there's at least in my neighborhood as we sit in the bowl of that area, we're already seeing significant changes in the storm water runoff coming from the apartment complex area directly adjacent to this um and the other recently built postcoid, I want to say 2021 neighborhood to the east of us. And so several of us are having backyard flooding issues already due to the increases in in buildings and nobody has really addressed any of that and I think that's all I have.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Keith. How much time? 10 minutes. 10 minutes remain. Is it Robert Roman? Six, seven, eight, nine, 10. Good evening. My name is Robert Romanuk. That was close.

My address is 2095 Gyro Drive, Winston Salem, 27127. I am the owner and current resident of the 3acre property immediately adjacent to the pro proposed Ephensia development. My wife and I have lived there for over 20 years. The west entire western boundary of my property borders this project and I appreciate the opportunity to express my concerns. First, I'm concerned about the storm water water management and erosion. The property slopes steeply toward our shared boundary. A poorly constructed runoff ditch currently runs along that line and its closest point is about 10 feet from my the southwest border of my home. Over time, erosion has intensified and without appropriate engineering controls, further develop development could exacerbate flooding, destabilize the soil, and threaten my residents. I respectfully request a professionally designed storm water plan that includes reinforced drainage, erosion control measures, and appropriate setbacks to protect adjacent properties. Second, the mature trees along the boundary present a safety risk. As erosion has progressed, several trees have begun leaning and in some cases have already fallen toward my home. I ask that a certified arborist evaluate the boundary area and that unsafe trees be removed or stabilized with a vegetative buffer installed to ensure long-term term safety environmental protection. Third, I'm concerned about the potential extension of Gyro Drive, although it's already been mentioned as not likely. The proposal suggests that the current deadend street may become an entrance to the condominium development. Such a change would introduce increased traffic noise and safety risks into what has long been a quiet residential area. I respectfully request that a traffic impact analysis and appropriate mitigation measures to preserve

neighborhood safety and character. Finally, aside from the fact that I won't be able to skinny dip in my hot tub anymore, I respectfully urge the board to consider any approval that includes enforceable conditions, address storm water management, erosion control, tree safety, buffering, and traffic impactments. That's it. Thank you very much. How much time is left? Eight minutes remaining.

All right. Is anyone else here uh that would like to speak in opposition to this case? All right. Seeing no one, I'll declare the public hearing closed. Mr. Chairman, if if I could just make just just one point of clarification. You know, obviously, you know, if this project is approved, it's approved contingent upon the site plan that's attached to this. In the staff report, it specifically talks about the fact that uh gyro drive it's not practicable to make that connection. That was one of the first things that was discussed on this probably over a year ago and the there was an analysis that was provided that our engineering staff took a look at and concurred that that could not be made. So the plan that's before you does not provide that connection. It does not show that connection. does show a water and sewer easement because the sewer has to be tied in through the probably the existing manhole at the end of gyro. And of course from a um water efficiency and delivery standpoint, you want your water lines looped at all possible uh so that you have uh better flow. So what is shown on the site plan as uh it looks like a road perhaps could go through there. That is a a proposed utility easement. So there would be no connection if this were to be approved as submitted. And I just want to make that clarification.

And they can't even change their common recreation area. Correct. And that's the other thing of course. Yeah. I mean in order to if they wanted to do that it would have to go back through the same approval process that it's going through now all the way back to city council to change it and then ultimately yes I mean they would have to u provide an alternative uh recreation area etc. But I did just want to clarify that under the proposed plan before you there is no connection to gyro. I had one question. Okay. All right. the going back to the what do you call that the area plan recommendations map if you could you got to speak into the microphone

I'm sorry going back to the area recommendations map that's it all right so the subdivision that shares Centry point it to the east that looks like a 20 or 30 unit project right there town homes town homes so that's the traffic that's coming down that portion of Sentry Point currently plus whatever single family residential there is coming in from I'm I'm just

Mr. lamb. There's actually uh there's that development. If you look at the three brown darker brown parcels, there's also three uh apartment/condominium complexes that use uh yeah, you can see right there with Falcon Tree and Watchmen Sentinel, Falcon Point Drive, and Sentry Point Court. Again, there's a large number of units there. So, I believe that's what the gentleman was referring to, which all exits out on Ardmore Road is the only way to get into that Penny Lane and then Sentry Point.

Thank you. Any other questions or discussion? All right. If not, was the pleasure of the board. Mr. Chairman, I'm sorry. Did Did you close the public hearing? And I was believe I did, but I will do it again just out of an abundance. Public hearing is now closed. Mr. Chairman, I move the planning board find that the request is consistent with the comp plan with a comprehensive plan. Second motion by Mr. Lamb, second by Mr. Pino. Any discussion? All in favor sign of I. I. Any opposed? Mr. Chairman, I further move the planning board recommend approval of W3681. Second. Motion by Mr. Lamb. Second by Mr. Any further discussion? All in favor? sign of I

I Any opposed? All right. And you know, again, I know it was uh stated before, but obviously this will move on with the city council. This will be heard at their May meeting. Uh and the date, I'm not exactly sure which, but it's the third. It'll be the third Monday of May, unless that's Memorial Day, which it shouldn't be because that's the fourth. Anyway, I believe it's the 18th. Out of curiosity, the the the erosion control plan that's been submitted, will the results of that be back in time for that hearing?

No. I mean, again, basically, they've they've submitted this preliminary drawing that, you know, basically passes muster as far as storm water and erosion control, etc. But what would happen is this is is if this were approved by the elected body then they would go they would come back through and actually submit detailed construction drawings which at that point would have the detailed erosion control plans, detailed storm water plans etc. So you know again you know this is this is formulated and you know has shown that it can meet the requirements but they would have to demonstrate that compliance through those construction drawings and ultimately in the field. It' be quantity and quality requirement, right? Correct. No change from what's there now.

Correct. Right. To the concerns about trees, and I know we've already voted on this, but you know, there are multiple tree save areas on there. Is there any further study that or approval that goes into that tree area? I mean storm water obviously you got to build out your plans or whatever but you can just designate a certain square footage of tree save and that's all you have to do for that right

so so chairman grubs a couple points on that there is tree save obviously there the ordinance requires a tree stand to be of sufficient quality slashhealth slash uh plant size to satisfy the intent of the ordinance but the other point that I was going to make uh to Mr. Romanuk's comment, it looks like based on where those proposed grade lines are on their site plan, if Brian can point those out with the cursor, they're within the 20ft buffer yard. So, it looks like they're going to be grading in where those trees are currently, and they're going to be planting a new type 2 buffer yard, which would meet the the concerns that the citizen was expressing about planting new healthy vegetation that is not going to lean over on his property. and possibly afford him some visual screening as well.

Mr. Chairman, board, with that, we'll move on to the next case, which is case B4. U Brian is going to handle this case. So, with that, I'll turn it over to him. All right. The case is W3682. Petitioner is Everly Development LLC. Um, this is a 37.21 21 acre uh site located along the north and south sides of Teague Road, east of Teague Meadow Lane. They are requesting a site plan amendment. The site was already reszoned for town homes back in 2023. Now they're coming back for a site plan amendment to place a single family planned residential development on the site. This is the growth management area uh growth management map. This is located in GMA3 suburban neighborhoods and this is the location map. Again, you can see the site is bisected by Teague Road. The majority of the site is on the north side and then the smaller areas on the south side of Teague. You can see there's a mixture of different zoning uh districts here. The current site is RM5S. You have single family zoning to the west and to the south and then some multif family zoning to the east of the site. And this is the aerial. You can see that the northern portion of the site uh has a branch of Fiddler's Creek running right through it. And so there's a significant amount of flood zone on that northern portion. And you can see those uh apartments there further to the east. This was the original area plan recommendation. It did recommend um single family residential at a density of zero to eight dwelling units per acre. Again, not rehashing too much on the prior site plan, but it was considered to be density neutral and along a uh major thorough affair. Therefore, that's why why the original resoning came through.

And this is looking west along Teague Road. The southern portion of the site is to the left. Um and then looking east on Teig Road. Southern portion of the site is to the right. This is looking west on Tigro. The northern portion is uh again to the right on this this frame. And apologies, some of our uh pictures didn't come through. So these are actually uh Google Maps imagery, but they were from per Google, it's from January of this year, so not a whole lot has changed. This is looking south into the south site from Teague Road. And then this is looking north from the site from Te Road. That's that uh single family home that's mentioned in the staff report. And this is the proposed site plan. Uh it is a 62 unit single family uh plane residential development. 38 lots are proposed on the north side and 24 lights on the south side. Uh originally uh it was proposed to have 96 town homes on this property. The site plan itself has uh largely been unchanged from a street design perspective. There's some small tweaks there. It's really about um pushing out some of where the single family homes are on the site, but the majority vast majority of the site on the northern side is proposed to remain uh undeveloped in common u common open space. Um there may have been some mention of an access easement. That was that picture that was uh shown just previously showing the access easement through there and they uh my understanding from the developers they're working with that of uh adjacent property owner to ensure that they continue to provide access uh through the site to get to the new public street. And just pointing out one item here that was mentioned in the staff report. There are several of these lots that uh are currently shown as existing in the 100red-year flood zone. That's

highlighted in blue there. Uh discussing with the engineer and the developer, they're going to go for they're going to apply to FEMA for a letter of map revision or LOM to FEMA. So, FEMA approves that based on their fill to get the pad sites out of the 100red-year flood zone. then they'll be approved to to to continue to build those sites and then um you know that that will certainly not affect the the insurance requirement for those homeowners as much. So I just wanted to point that out. The site plan uh itself uh the request is we found to be consistent with the general recommendations of 42045 and the south of ruin area plan update. Uh the request would allow for additional needed housing units in the serviceable land area with direct access to a minor thoroughare and the general layout and design of this request is consistent with the original approval. Um the the site plan does meet all UDO requirements and staff recommends approval of this request. Be happy to answer any questions you might have.

The original site plan, what did it have in that flood plane area? Um, I don't have it shown very well here, but this was the original site plan and this was the town home and that's kind of the B. I don't know if you can see my pointer is very small. Let me see if I can zoom in here. You can kind of see the edge of that building caught the floods in. So, they would have had to have done the same thing for that one town home unit, but they are they are pushing a little bit further north for those individual single family lots. Brian, we're not seeing the pointer. Oh, apologies. So, I can't I think I could zoom in and do the the pointer at the same time. Apologies.

With the field to get the FEMA revision on the flood plan, they'll still be within the the allowable fill area.

Correct. The ordinance does allow filling in 50% and 50 50% of the distance and 50% of the area. Again, this is a relatively small area and if they get that LMER letter of map provision, what that's going to do is basically save the property owners from having to pay the flood insurance. If if I could just offer just one piece of commentary. Um, you know, this is they're proposing um to do this under the existing RM5s as a site plan amendment. So again, this has to go back to the elected body. It is a departure from what was originally approved. Um, if they had decided to do this from the beginning, the original reasonzoning reszoned this from, I believe, RS9 to RM5S to do the town home development. If they had just come in with an RS9 development from the very beginning, they could have done this exact same design and it would have been a planning board review. I just point that out. Again, I'm sure we're going to hear some valid concerns uh from the surrounding property owners, but I did just want to provide that little bit of commentary. It's because this is previously been been reszoned to RM5s and this is a departure from the approved plan. It has to go back to the elected body. But again, had they not reszoned it a couple years ago, this could have been done as a PRD under existing zoning. And with that, we can answer any other questions that you might have.

Yeah. And what was the difference again in the um the TIA for the town homes versus the 62 units versus the 96? So, uh, Miss Schwab, just just to clarify for the audience, a TIA wasn't required. In terms of a traffic impact study, but in terms of the trip generation, the town home development was showing 96 units at a trip generation rate of 557 trips per day. The single family product is going to be 63 units at 602 trips per day. So, very comparable. It's it's plus 45. uh going to single family.

Any other questions for staff before we start public hearing?

All right, we'll begin our public hearing. Signed up in support, I've got Vince Townsen. Uh hello, Vince Townsend. Uh 1A Wendy Court, Greensboro 27409 is the zip code. Excuse me. Um I'm a civil engineer and I prepared the plans both for this and for the previous uh town home project. And the previous developers, they got close to the end and found that it wasn't financially feasible to do town homes. So they've been I guess they've had it on the market. I don't know all of this, but the people I'm working for now are looking at purchasing it and developing it as single family. and they have to get as many units as possible and this is what layout they came up with to make it a financially feasible project. Um the street layout's fundamentally the same. Um the plans are very similar. Um and I'm just here to answer questions. The developers couldn't make it tonight so I'm here in their theirstead. So do you have any questions for me now or

any questions for Mr. Towns? All right. Thank you. All right. Thank you, Mr. Towns. Thanks. How much time's left? Over 11 minutes. Um, anyone else here uh that like would like to speak in in support of this proposal? All right, we'll shift the opposition then. I've got um Muhammad Essa. Um, hello. Uh, my name is Muhammad Gabber Essa. I am uh the current resident and homeowner of 2140 Morning Star Lane. Um I live north of What's your zip code? I'm sorry. Uh 27107.

Thank you.

Okay. And um thank you first of all for allowing us to voice our concerns. Um our concerns are first of all we're afraid that there is not enough buffer of forestry between our uh houses and the current development. Uh also we're afraid that um there is not enough uh management of storm uh water. We're afraid of like uh flooding and um also we want to be put in in the picture of uh when this going to be uh started uh if there is like any um efforts made to mitigate the noise, the dust uh that's going to be caused by the construction. Um also um very importantly I want to make sure that uh there there are like um no road uh connections between Morning Star Lane and the current development. Uh we're afraid that this is going to increase uh traffic and uh our neighborhood is a quite um single family uh homes. Um and um it's it's a dead end. It's it's not uh the current like um um infrastructure doesn't I believe um allow for increased traffic to the development. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Anyone else? There's no one else signed up. Is any would anyone else like to speak in opposition? Come on up. Give us your name, address, and zip code for the record, please. Um, I'm Mr. Muhammad's neighbor. Uh, 2122 Morning Star Lane. My name is Erin Whisten Hunt. Um, so this kind of rolled in on both of us this morning. Uh, realized what was happening. So we we threw some stuff together. Um, but north of that creek, you can't see it on the on either of these screens, but north of that creek is our property. at work today. I had time to go through this map and this the flood planes on this map is not accurate. I've seen it on my own property. I've been there. My grandparents built that house. I've been involved with that property my entire life. Um and the flood plane is much wider in in actuality than shows on this map. um the hard surfaces that are going in. My main concern is that there's going to be less and I don't know it's not a lot less, but there's going to be less um open ground to absorb the water. It's going to grab the water and pipe it into that creek, which I'm scared will back it up more. And twice in the past 10 years, I've had to throw sandbags at the edge of my garage to keep the water off of the foundation of the garage. Um the second concern we had was again you can't see it on the map but our property is just north and the that property goes uh across that creek. Um and we realize it now but when we signed up to speak today is we were concerned that the northern portion was also going to get um developed and send a bunch of traffic through our neighborhood. I realize now that that's not going to happen but we worry about it in the future. And um the trees that Mr.

Muhammad also mentioned, we would like to see the plan, the final plan, keep uh the tree buffer zones um between the dead end of this uh development and the backside of our properties just north of it. Um if nothing else, just to keep the construction noise down while this is happening, uh Mr. Muhammad and I both have to work some nights. Um, I'm in construction as well and he's a doctor. So, it's uh the night work is going to be a bother. So, we would like to see the the the tree buffers on stay if possible. Thank you all.

Thank you very much. Anyone else like to speak in opposition? All right. Seeing no one, I'll declare the public hearing closed. Any questions or discussion? So, I was trying to figure out where the the property and the specific trees and buffers they're speaking about would be. If if you go to that image there, probably the the live Morning Star is that circular drive that then goes back out and connects to Rosman. Okay.

Uh and probably some other side streets that eventually get you back out to Old Lexington Road. Um again on the north side of the creek and of course you know what has shown here for development does not show a connection u to um cash drive but if you I would point out if you go to the site plan I mean again I just want to make sure is there can we pull up I'll have to pull bear with me

the there is the the property on the north side of the creek itself is not part of this proposal. They have carved that five acres out as a quote unquote out parcel that theoretically could be sold to someone else for development in the future. It's not part of this. It's it's part of this request in that it is encumbered by the original approval. So, it's still covered under the S, but they're not showing development up there. So if they were to come through and develop that piece of property on the north side of that creek close to where the development is, they would have to run through another site plan amendment uh back to that wasn't included in the density calculations. Correct. Okay.

And everything else north of the road that they're building is tree safe area. Correct. So if anything were if anything were to ever happen if Brian if you can go to the out parcel area that that area over there I mean we can't sit here definitively and say nothing would ever happen there the calculations have that area carved out it's still encumbered by the RM5S plan. So if that were to ever be sold

they would have to go through the same process and go back for a site plan amendment. And again I'm sure that Mr. towns can't speak for his clients since they're not here. But again, it may be that if the planning board were so inclined or maybe they go back and talk to, you know, he goes back and talks to his clients and, you know, whenever this before this goes to the elected body, they may make the decision to um just show that as open space area to provide some assurances to the neighbors on that north side that that would never be developed. But I mean, again, I can't make that call for Mr. Townson. He probably can't make it for his clients as we sit here today. But that's something that they could consider before it went to city council.

It's not part of this case that five acres. Correct. He's reserved it for a future development. Right. It's it has nothing to do with what we are deciding on today. Okay. It wasn't part of either site plan. Okay. The current or the site plan that's currently in effect or this revised site plan. Correct. So this case it is impossible to connect to that road. Correct. Right. And and all the tree safe area will be non-graded area. That's right. And and again the all the math and the calculations to meet the density requirements and as as Chris said is exclusive of this out parcel.

Okay. Okay. Any other discussion questions? with the pleasure of the board. Mr. Chairman, I move the planning board find the request is consistent with a comprehensive plan. Second. Commission by Mr. Lamb. Second by Mr. Patino. Any discussion? All in favor sign of I. I. Mr. Chairman, I further move the planning board recommend approval of W3682. Second. Motion by Mr. Lamb. Second by Mr. Patin. Any further discussion? All in favor sign of I. I. I. Any opposed?

All right. And and again, this will move forward to city council unless the city council has changed their meeting dates. I did look it up. It would be the May 18th is whenever this would go to city council, but if you spoke today or if you got a notification um for the first for this hearing via us from us, you'll get another notification whenever it's time to go to city council. Mr. Chairman of board, with that, uh that concludes all the items on the agenda. I will go to staff report real quick and I'll turn to Kirk Ericson who will give us a preview of your work session coming up in two weeks.

All right. Uh again, good evening, good afternoon board members. We have three items at this point uh slated for the April work session. The first is it's been a few years since we've done this. So, we're going to have another cleanup text amendment. Steve Smotherman will be presenting that uh again just to fix some uh errors that we've discovered through using the ordinance, interpretation calls, things of that nature over the last few years. But again, Steve will be presenting that. Then at our last public hearing meeting, this board asked uh if we could give a presentation on the annual development dashboard report for calendar year 2025.

Dan Roberts is going to be presenting that information to the board. And then we also have a presentation from the Historic Resources Commission of their annual report. So that's what we've got at this uh at this juncture, Mr. Chairman. And again, happy to answer any questions. All right. And with that, now I'll turn to Mark who'll give you your May uh case preview.

Sure. We got eight total items coming up. Three new resoning cases. a case you may have heard of in the news, a continued reszoning case from close to rural hall and a text amendment that um Kirk talked about and three new planning board reviews. Um I'll also call attention as my next item under staff report. you'll see on the screen there. Uh the next uh the third meeting in the northeast suburban area plan uh process will take place on Wednesday, April 29th at 5 uh at 5:30 uh and going to 7:30 at the transportation technology center where this uh first two meetings have taken place there on North Patterson Avenue. So again um hopefully we'll get some uh good attendance at that. We've had uh probably 30 plus folks at both meetings. I think we've had some uh some online responses and other things u to provide input there. So again, we'll continue to refine that as we move forward. Uh the last thing to call your attention to and it was alluded to whenever Brian was doing the continuation request for project ironpur F-1669. But I do want to again publicize this as much as we can so that folks understand obviously at this point it's planned to be heard on the 14th of May. Uh and that's the way we have to proceed. It very well could get continued again. They have a number of issues that they are trying to working through uh that they were trying to work through based on some of the concerns that staff had with their site plan. Some of those are fairly engineer intensive. Um, we won't know for a couple weeks whether or not they get the revised plan back in for the May cycle. If they do not, it could get continued to June. Again, it has not yet. So, as we sit here today, we have to plan that this is going to be heard at your May meeting. As a result of that, because of the limitations in this building with accommodating larger

crowds, we have decided we are going to hold regardless of whether it's continued again or not, we can't answer that question. We have to plan for it. We're going to hold the May public hearing in city council. Uh it has a larger occupancy in the crowd and it also has better overflow rooms in city hall. We will also use this as an overflow room. I have no idea how many folks are going to show up. Could be 50, could be a couple hundred, who knows? Um but I did want to publicize that. So at this point as we sit here today, we have to plan on project Iron Spur for the data center being heard on the 14th of May. and we plan on holding that in the city council chambers.

What is the zoning required for that project if it were to be approved? Well, they are requesting LIS.

LIS, limited industrial special use. You pose an interesting question in that the use that they are requesting in our out of our UDO because we have other data centers that have been approved through either special use districts zoning or just through permitting. Our ordinance classifies those as services A uses. A uses can go in lots of zoning districts. The data center like that we have for Wells Fargo in downtown, the data center that we have for Wells Fargo at Fereralon and Silus Creek are data centers. What we're dealing with here is the scale and intensity of the data center. This is proposed between 1.3 and 1.4 million square feet. It's proposed to have around 200 air cooled chillers um water cooled chillers, heat exchangers, generators, those kind of things. So it's we have to classify it as its closest use. What this is is is an intensity consideration. Is this the appropriate place for this intensity? I will tell you and we can have a further discussion at the at at your work session, but the general statutes 160D 601 uh that was approved as part of the Helen Recovery Bill, there was a piece of legislation that was inserted in that bill that prevents local governments from quote unquote downzoning property and that includes reducing the number of uses that someone has and perhaps limiting the density. So at a staff level and elected body level or a planning board level, if there was a desire for us to go in and try to modify our ordinance to handle a data center at the scale and intensity that we're talking about for kind of AIdriven data centers,

we couldn't do that under the current statutes because more than likely we would create a new use and we would be taking away a right that someone currently has uh like if you have a piece of property that's zoned LB, you can do services A. I'm not saying you'd be able to do this type of a data center because there are other considerations you have to have, but someone could make the argument if we were to introduce changes to the UDO that we would be taking away one of their rights. That's as we sit here today. You know, there have been discussions around the state surrounding this. This isn't isn't unique to Winston Salem or for Scythe County. Uh this is something that has received a lot of discussion from units of local government around the state. I don't know whether anything will happen in the short session to try to address that. I know that the municipalities, the um Association of County Commissioners all have concerns with that language because again it takes away local control to address sort of emerging trends in land use, developing trends, new intensities that weren't contemplated when the original ordinance went into place. I say all that because again I want folks to understand that if the data center proposed in rural hall is voted down or withdrawn or anything else that may be seen as a victory in this particular instance. But if someone has existing zoning and they meet all the other criteria that a site uh designer and developer are looking for and it's has the appropriate zoning, they can come in and pull a permit for this today.

And there aren't any limitations on power or cooling or anything like that. Correct. Yeah. Yeah. What is the square footage of the Wells Fargo Salis Creek Parkway? Is it a 200,000 foot building? I I don't know that we've specifically looked at that. I know it's probably it's less than 100,000. It's probably less than it's probably less than three or four acres would be my guess. It's that's that's all that is a guess. We haven't looked at it.

Uh but again, I know that those are the two examples that I know. And again, that's probably being I won't say shortsighted. Those are the ones that we know about. I'm sure that there are probably some other data centers that exist that probably sell server space, you know, that have been done in the past to, you know, private folks who, you know, need it. but don't have the folks to manage that technology and probably needed it before you had all the cloud computing services that exist today. But those are the two that I specifically know of. And with that, I'm finished with my staff report. I know we kind of got into Q&A, which is fine, but I hope we'll get a pretty good briefing on this at work session.

How much how much design do you have available to you so far? You said 200 is it 200 chillers? Is that what you said?

Yeah, I mean, we have the site plan. Obviously, we've asked them, you know, as part of our best effort to, you know, again, we don't, our recommendation isn't public at this point. We haven't made a recommendation. We want to see what the revised plan shows. But even if we were to recommend approval, we always have to assume assume that there's a potential that the elected body may approve it. So, we always try to have adjustments made to the site plan that we think would at least minimize the impacts to surrounding property to owners. I don't think we can say that we would negate those impacts. So we have a plan of record right now that was submitted. They are in the process of revising that, but we certainly can brief the planning board on, you know, kind of what that site plan shows.

Will this will their backup electrical include gas powered turbines? And again, that's one of the things that we have concerns about. That's one of the things that we have told them we need to know what they're doing. And you know, more than likely we would have a condition of approval that would prohibit that. Obviously, you know, you can have backup emergency generators, but again, that's for reliability. We would not want to have those where they're just running them continuously so that they could supplement their power and, you know, so again, those are the kind of things that have to be considered as part of our analysis. Okay.

Um, I don't know how to correctly word this, so bear with me if you will. Um, this is such a new to this planning board is not new to America. It's not new to the state. It's not new to cities, but it's new to us. um in in your staff's uh efforts to date, um is there any information we can learn from regarding best practices um suggested criteria going forward, etc., etc., because I feel like I'm going to walk into the room with blinders on.

I mean, again, I think part of our analysis will lay some of that out. You know, obviously, you know, if you do online research, you can find things that, you know, kind of espouse the pros, kind of espouse the cons. If anyone read the op-ed piece in the paper from, I believe Tuesday, you had a prosect and a consect in the in the op-ed piece in the journal. Um, you know, there are some things that again anecdotally that staff can say. You know, obviously if you're looking at a here to four traditional data center, you had a few chillers and a few generators. Um, you know, whenever you look at the scale of having a couple hundred of those and then what that might mean as far as a noise impact and environmental impacts if you're running the generators and those kind of things. Again, we can kind of provide some of that information. We can provide some some research information that we've seen that kind of you know shows that through the year 2023 um you know all the power consumption in uh in the country was around 200 terowatts which is trillion watts because of the rise of data centers they're showing that by the early 2030s the US need for energy is going to be like 600 terowatt so almost triple the amount ount of power because these things are so intensive needing cooling and again just the scale and the number of these that are being proposed. So again we can provide some of that context but obviously you know that is just you know doing research and those kind of things. I mean, you know, you will hear, I'm sure, whenever this does come to a public hearing, you will hear um the, you know, the pros from the folks who are proposing it, and you will hear, you know, some of the same things that I've probably cited here, uh, and, you know, other things that I haven't cited. But again, you know, there are still we are probably no different than you

except we've had a little more time to do a little more research and you know and kind of look at what some other communities have done. But you know this again this is still an emerging technology and this is the first one that we've ever looked at ourselves. I've done a fair amount of reading so I think I have a grasp on what the issues are. I just don't have a grasp on what the best practice solutions are. Yes. So new. Yeah. Um if when Don Flo proposed his amphitheater downtown and there was a concern about noise, there's a noise ordinance that said you can't exceed this. We don't we don't have any of those.

Technically there's type of data center. Technically, we just now got a noise ordinance that addresses the amphitheater uh hereto for the the city used the county's noise ordinance which basically said, you know, you can't pro you can't um create noise that is uh noxious to a reasonable I can't remember exactly what standard is, but there's no actually decibel level. So again, that's one of those things that, you know, at this point since this a is a county thing, there's not any decibel level that even addresses that. So

yeah, changing the topic, your uh staff, our staff for the Northeast Area Plan did a great job. Presenter did a fabulous job, I thought, with the uh 15 20 minute presentation. Good questions. That's what I've heard. I got called out in the hall discussing something else. I never made it in there, but I heard lots of rave reviews about our staff and again I mean I got to sample quite a few of the tables and everyone always tries to give like Amy and Kirk and myself kudos but you know again at the end of the day it's because of our staff that I mean again they we have a bunch of rock stars across the board everywhere. So I really appreciate you saying that and we'll pass that along.

Did a good job. All right. Anything else for the good of the order to run? Have our motion to adjurnn. Second. Thank you. Thank you, man. Good meeting. Was it if you want a good piece of information to Oh, I love it. Go find go look. Go try to find It shouldn't be a problem. I don't want to send you the link. Go try to find the apex PowerPoint presentation on their January work. It it was it was their city council planning board. for city council's work session for the town of God tells me no

about 94 but I I don't want to say that data center it's very good Apex County January 2026 data center I appate I'm just I actually better appreciate this actually very