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HomeMy WebLinkAboutA014 - Council Action Form dated March 6, 2018 s ITEM # 29 DATE: 03-06-18 COUNCIL ACTION FORM SUBJECT: ZONING TEXT AMENDMENT FOR LINCOLN WAY CORRIDOR PLAN IMPLEMENTATION OF THE DOWNTOWN GATEWAY COMMERCIAL ZONING DISTRICT STANDARDS BACKGROUND: The Downtown Gateway area is a Focus Area for redevelopment identified within the Lincoln Way Corridor Plan. The Downtown Gateway area is generally described as propertied on the north and south side of Lincoln Way extending from Grand Avenue to Duff Avenue (Attachment 1-Potential Rezoning Area). The Corridor Plan identified redevelopment and repositioning of commercial properties in the Downtown Gateway Area to support a transition to more intense and urban development. To facilitate this desired change to the area staff believes allowing for mixed-use residential development and reductions in parking requirements are beneficial. Additionally, any new zoning will need to strike a balance between accommodating commercial uses in traditional one and two-story buildings while allowing for multi-story redevelopment that includes housing versus mandating multi-story development. Staff believes continuing to emphasize commercial use as a priority in the Downtown Gateway Area is important along Lincoln Way. Staff proposes a new special purpose zoning district for the Downtown Gateway area. The proposed zoning is a new district for the City and is not an overlay of the existing Highway Oriented Commercial (HOC) zoning district or Downtown Service Center. (DSC) zoning district. The proposed special purpose district includes standards based upon site size and proposed uses with specific street frontage requirements. The allowed uses are similar to those of the Downtown Service Center zoning district rather than the Highway Oriented Commercial zoning distinct. Uses Allowed uses are intended to be a more focused set of commercial uses compared to the HOC zoning district. The allowed uses principally include office, retail sales and services, restaurant, recreation, and entertainment uses. The intent behind the list of allowed uses is to focus on the desired commercial uses while helping to insure compatibility with any future residential that could be added to the area. The proposed zone will prohibit the following uses that are permitted in the HOC zoning district: vehicle service facilities (gas stations and auto repair), vehicle sales, college and university, lodges and social clubs, catering establishments(primary use), medical centers, wholesale trade, detention facilities, sports practice facilities, and mini-warehouse. By prohibiting these uses it would preclude new establishments and also make existing uses non- conforming. For example, a gas station that exists today would become 1 a nonconforming and be allowed to continue to operate as is, but they would be unable to expand or if they cease to operate it could not be restarted. Drive through windows and pickup areas are also restricted within the proposed zoning standards. Drive through uses are not precluded in their entirety, but would have separation requirements. The proposed spacing standard is for no more than one drive through use per Lincoln Way street block face and no drive through uses are permitted along Kellogg Avenue. A drive through would be precluded if any part of the property had frontage along a block face of Lincoln Way that already has a drive through use, regardless of the ingress/egress to the site. The drive through limitation would apply to any type of use, fast food, banks, pharmacies, etc. Residential uses for short-term lodging are permitted as a standalone use; however, household living may only be established as part of a mixed-use development. Major Site Development Plan review is required for any residential mixed-use development. No density standard will apply to the residential development for either a minimum or maximum. The goal is to promote smaller units at higher density and to allow for a limited number of larger units. No more than 25 percent of the total units in a development may exceed two bedrooms. No dwelling units shall exceed four bedrooms. The proposed zoning standards do not prescribe a minimum total commercial square footage requirement in combination with mixed-use buildings. Specific tenant spaces sizes, orientation, and total square footage in a project will need to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis to determine if a proposed mixed-use design achieves the goals of the Corridor Plan for commercial first development plans that enhance the commercial options for the city and are complimentary to Downtown. Parkinq The proposed commercial standards are a hybrid of standard parking requirements and the reduced parking standards of Downtown Service Commercial. Staff did incorporate parking minimums for the district due to the lack of public parking in the immediate area and the desire to ensure that the commercial development was viable for a large range of uses. The proposed parking modifies commercial parking standards by reducing parking for larger sites to promote shared and common parking areas, principally for bar and restaurant uses. Individually developed sites are subject to standard parking requirements for commercial uses. Staff also added a fast food parking standard that is at 9 spaces per 1,000 square feet so as to not incent redevelopment with fast food establishments in this area. The proposed requirement for commercial parking results in the 100 Block of Kellogg Avenue requiring parking compared the current DSC zoning where none is required. For the HOC zoned properties there is either no change or a potential reduction compared to current standards. Residential parking standards are also a hybrid of the standards used in other parts of the City. The typical apartment standard is one parking space per bedroom. However, Campustown and Downtown only require one space per apartment 2 regardless of the number of bedrooms. In an effort to incentivize smaller apartment units and to recognize the area is highly walkable with multiple transportation options, parking is reduced for smaller units. Staff believes this a balance of allowing for a variety of unit configurations while promoting construction of smaller apartment units. Apartment Parking Spaces Required Studio 0.8 per unit 1 Bedroom 0.8 per unit 2 Bedroom 1.0 per unit 3 Bedroom 2.5 per unit 4 Bedroom 4.0 per unit The parking standards also permit additional reductions in parking through Major Site Development Plan approval. There are allowances for shared parking, remote parking, and collective parking. Reductions of up to 25% of the commercial parking can be approved through these options. Another unique standard relates to allowing for residential to be utilized in a shared or collective parking situation when at least one parking space per dwelling unit is provided on site assigned to the residential use. Typically, shared use of residential parking spaces is not permissible in other zoning districts. The parking requirements include a bicycle parking standard for commercial uses. However, there are no mandatory bicycle parking standards for residential uses. Staff believes that most new residential apartment development accommodates bicycle parking and does not believe a prescribed parking standard is needed. However, for commercial uses visitor parking is not typically addressed by developers. Staff proposes requiring a minimum of four bicycle rack parking spaces with each building and that larger buildings include additional parking. A reduction in vehicle parking spaces can be accommodated with the provision of bicycle parking, with a maximum reduction of five vehicle parking spaces. Lot Standards The site development standards are intended to promote property aggregation to take advantage of increased development intensity compared to the current HOC zoning. Existing sites and buildings will not become non-conforming based upon lot size. Existing sites may be used in their current configuration and buildings can be modified under the new standards. However, mixed-use residential development with reduced parking standards will only apply to larger scale sites. Minimum Lot Size is 1 acre and 100 feet of frontage on a public street for redevelopment intensification standards. Lots less than 1 acre in size or with less than 100 feet of frontage are subject to a use restriction of commercial uses only and must comply with standard parking requirements. A 1 acre standard means that for almost all properties in the Gateway Area that at least one additional property will need to be combined with another parcel to get to the larger site size for mixed use development. 3 For comparison, if the site size was set at 0.5 acres there would be approximately 22 out of 70 properties that could develop mixed use without property aggregation. Buildinq Setbacks The Downtown Gateway Area consists of a street hierarchy with primary streets of Lincoln Way, Kellogg Avenue, Clark Avenue, and Duff Avenue. Secondary streets include Washington Avenue, Sherman Avenue, Market Avenue, Commerce Avenue, and Gilchrist Street. Additionally there are alleys within most of the block areas. Staff proposes to differentiate setbacks based upon street type and intended design aesthetic for the blocks. In most cases there are minimal setbacks required to either encourage a building to be built up to the street, as is the case along Kellogg Avenue, or to ensure a site is redevelopable when accounting for lot sizes and restrictions on where parking is permitted on a site. The greatest setback is planned along Lincoln Way. This is due to the intended larger scale of buildings along Lincoln Way and the intent to include widened sidewalks along with redevelopment due to the narrow right-of-way width for Lincoln Way. Setbacks for corner properties can be reduced through design review when the buildings include specific features supportive of a pedestrian design. There are no proposed minimum side or rear setbacks required for redevelopment projects. Building Desiqn Due to the desired flexibility of uses and redevelopment options for the area, individual design standards are difficult to apply consistently through the district. The intent is to state base design standards and rely upon individual project review to ensure consistency with the overall design intent for the area. The Kellogg Avenue frontage has design preferences for storefront patterns of 25 feet for consistency with Main Street buildings. However, due to design options to promote gathering areas and entertainment uses, alternative design approaches can be approved that include high activity spaces and pedestrian friendly design features at the ground floor. The other areas in the district do not require a storefront pattern. Kellogg Avenue includes design standard to act as a transition to historic Downtown with a minimum of two-story buildings, architectural detailing, high levels of glazing, and the use of clay brick facade materials. There are no specified percentages for brick, but it is a required material for each building. Properties with frontage on other streets do not have as many mandatory standards. The design standards do require facade variation and detailing with use of clay brick without a specified percentage. 4 Planninq and Zoning Commission The Planning and Zoning Commission first reviewed issues related to creating a new zoning, district at its November 15, 2017 meeting. Staff described the overall goals for the new zoning standards and some of the trade-offs in allowing for a wide range of flexibility. The Commission provided a consensus opinion of support for standards addressing the following issues: • Property aggregation for larger site redevelopment. • Rezoning of both sides of Lincoln Way. • Allow for Mixed use development with smaller apartments sizes, but allow for some larger residential apartment units that exceed two-bedrooms. • Allow for reduced parking compared to standard parking rates and encourage shared parking. • Limit auto oriented uses, including drive through uses. • Limit parking between buildings and a street. • Includes design requirements that differentiate Kellogg Avenue as the gateway to Downtown with similar storefront patterns at the ground level. The Planning and Zoning Commission reviewed the draft standards at their February 7, 2018 meeting and recommended approval of a draft ordinance with a 6-0 vote. The Commission discussed some of the outcomes of the zoning on nonconforming uses, building design requirements, reduced parking allowances, and the potential subsequent area for rezoning. The Commission also recommended addressing bicycle parking requirements and reviewing streetscape standards to include street trees. Public Input Staff provided mailed notification to property owners in the Downtown Gateway Area of a workshop on March 1st to discuss the proposed standards. Information about the draft standards and a presentation on the Downtown Gateway area is posted online on the Planning Division website. Approximately 10 people attended. Most of the attendees were small business owners in the area. Questions were asked about the policies for land use changes in the area and how the area is different than Downtown. Three small business owners expressed concerns about how they could remodel or redevelop their properties compared to the current standards of HOC and DSC. A number of concerns were brought up concerning nonconformities that would occur if zoning is changed from HOC to Downtown Gateway Commercial for property owners that did not have an interest in redevelopment. Questions also were asked about changing the 100 Block of Kellogg from DSC to Downtown Gateway Commercial and how the mandatory building and parking requirements would affect these properties. 5 ALTERNATIVES: 1. The City Council can approve on first reading the proposed ordinance to create the new Downtown Gateway Commercial Zoning District. 2. The City Council can recommend alternative language for the proposed text amendment. 3. The City Council can request additional information and defer making a recommendation. CITY MANAGER'S RECOMMENDED ACTION: The proposed zoning standards are an attempt to address the flexible design options for a wide range of uses, site sizes, and design priorities for different street frontages within the Downtown Gateway Area. The tradeoff of this approach is less predictability on final outcomes as many decisions on design will not be complete until final approval of a project. Reuse of small sites will be permitted with staff approved Minor Site Development Plans. Major redevelopments or mixed-use developments will be subject to the Major Site Development Plan requirements where alternative standards may also be approved for a project. Staff proposes no maximum height, floor area ratio, or density standards for development within the district. No base landscape or open space - percentage requirements are included within the standards. Development would be required to comply with surface parking and front yard landscaping requirements for conventional development; however, redevelopment with large scale buildings and pedestrian oriented designs along streets would be exempt from most landscaping requirements in recognition of the urban design goals of the district. The changes to allowed uses in the area will create a handful of non-conformities for vehicle oriented uses, such as gas stations, car washes, and auto repair if the zoning district is applied to all the properties within the area shown in Attachment 1. A final decision on the applicability of the zoning district to specific properties is not part.of the review at this time and will be a separate noticed public hearing for review of a rezoning request initiated by the City. With City Therefore, it is the recommendation of the City Manager that the City Council approve Alternative #1 to approve on first reading the ordinance for the new Downtown Gateway Commercial Zoning District. 6