HomeMy WebLinkAbout2020-02-19 TranscriptionPage I
Council Present: Bergus, Salih, Teague, Taylor, Weiner
Council Absent: Mims, Thomas
Staff Present: Fruin, Monroe, Dilkes, Fruehling, Hightshoe, Russett, Heitner
Others Present: Eastham, Eyestone, Godwin, Roesler, Williams (ICCSD); Perez, Galindez
(Opticos)
Welcome and Introductions:
Teague/ Welcome to Iowa City City Hall and I am callin', urn .... together this joint meetin'
between the Iowa City Community School District and the City Council of Iowa City, uh,
here on Wednesday, February 19, 2020. And we are going to, um, just, uh, really do
some introductions up here, uh, from the City and the School Board, and we'll start all
the way far to my right!
Eastham/ Charlie Eastham with the Iowa City School (mumbled) School Board.
Eyestone/ Shawn Eyestone from the School Board.
Weiner/ Janice Weiner, City Council.
Taylor/ Pauline Taylor, City Council.
Salib/ Mazahir Salih, City Council.
Teague/ Bruce Teague, City Council.
Godwin/ Janet Godwin, Iowa City School District School Board.
Bergus/ Laura Bergus, Iowa City City Council.
Roesler/ And over here at the kid's table (laughter) Paul Roesler, the School Board (laughter)
Teague/ Welcome, everybody! We're happy that you're here with us today, and this is a very, uh,
important topic that we're gonna be havin', which is Item 93 on our agenda, which is
discussion of the new zoning code, and so I'm gonna invite Anne Russett up from Iowa
City Plannin' and Zoning.
Discussion of New Zoning Code:
Russett/ Thank you, Mayor. Good afternoon, and thank you Members of the School Board for
joining us for this joint session. We have our consultant team here today, um, from
Opticos Design — Martin Galindez and Tony Perez — they've been working with us for,
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council and the
ICCSD joint meeting/work session of February 19, 2020.
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um, well we originally contracted with Opticos several years ago to work on the initial
phase of this study and right now we're in phase two, and Martin and Tony have been
working with us over the past year, now working on a new, uh, form based zoning
regulation for a portion of the South District. So Tony has provided, uh, will be
providing a presentation on kind of how we got to this point, where we're at now. He's
gonna give some background on, um, the vision for this area and the, uh, a general
overview of the draft regulations. So I'm going to turn it over to Tony Perez with
Opticos Design.
Teague/ Great! Welcome, Tony!
Perez/ Thank you, Mayor. Uh, I remember you from the last time I was in town, um,
congratulations!
Teague/ I appreciate it! Thank you!
Perez/ Um .... uh, thank you, City Council and Members of the School District, uh, as Anne said,
we're here to provide you an update of how ...about the whole South District plan and the
code, how we got to this point, and where we are, and a little bit about today's, uh,
feedback. We're actually in town today, uh, this .... this morning and just up to about half
an hour ago we've been meeting with landowners, and getting their feedback and their
comments on the draft code. So, uh, a little bit more about that later. Uh, see how to
work this here .... so tonight, uh, we'll .... we wanna try and do our three things, um,
review process and... and input received so far; um, then talk about what this code will
make. All this input and all this process up to now, you know, what .... what's it all about?
What does it .... what is trying to happen? Um, and then we'll talk to you about the tool to
make it happen, the code. So, the process so far, uh, in 2015, um, the City prepared and
adopted the South District comprehensive plan. And that comprehensive plan for the
South District is a refinement of your entire comprehensive plan for the whole city,
and ... and so in implementing that, uh, two years later we were hired in 2017 to come in
and do this phase one study, which basically said let's take what .... let's take what the
South District plan talked about, and work with the community to find out what .... what
does that mean in more .... more detail, let's drill down on that, find out how to implement
this policy direction at the high level, the comprehensive plan. Let's drill down on that,
and these things stuck out. So the feedback, uh, at those workshops was, the community
wanted neighborhood centers with walkable amenities in residential development. They
want to expand on established open spaces with a strong network of trails and parks.
They want to address housing opto... options, and they even said that this was a .... this
area was a great opportunity for missing middle housing, and we'll talk about that later,
but missing middle housing is something that was observed by Dan Parolek in our office
and .... and he saw that across the country the two extremes of housing were being
addressed, but not the middle. The two extremes being single-family houses, which are
great, and big apartments, which are another thing, but in between, all of those things that
we used to build, duplexes, four-plexes, courtyard building, six-plexes, things that were
the size of houses, that used to be built in neighborhoods. If you look in older
neighborhoods and they're there, and they fit really well into neighborhoods. We stopped
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council and the
ICCSD joint meeting/work session of February 19, 2020.
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doing that, and so that's why he called it the missing middle. So we'll talk about that a
little later. So they said there was great opportunities for doing that here, and for needs of
a range of families, and to improve street connectivity, improve walkability, and then
introduce new zoning to make this happen, because it was realized at the time that the
zoning in place would not necessarily very easily deliver this kind of place that we're
talking about. So, there was a workshop in 2017 and maybe some of. ... well, were any of
you there? You were there, okay. I don't know if you're in these pictures, but there's a
lot of pictures of locals at this workshop. Uh, we talk about, and I included these pictures
this time because I wanted to make sure people were.... we're not makin' this up (laughs)
It really happened, and that's where this feedback and direction came from. Uh.... then a
year later we were hired to implement that direction. We got that feedback and now,
okay, let's implement it and as everybody observed, the standards in place right
now .... the long way through that whole process can get you to what the vision is. But
because the standards aren't necessarily set up to deliver that, it's .... it's really not in
anyone's interest to do that. So the idea was, hey, let's develop a new tool to specifically
generate these places that we're talking about that we want. Um, and it's not that the
current zoning was developed in a way to be preventative or, you know, people had some
kind of idea. It's that, like I said before .... the zoning in most cities in America was
developed from the standpoint of preventing things, not making things. And so your
zoning's no different, and that's why you see cities across the country increasingly
changing their zoning to be responsive to what they want, instead of only responding to
what they don't want. So form based zoning is all about what you want, um, and it's a
can -do code. What can I do? It tells you, and it just happens to make places that are
walkable and ... uh, inhuman scale. Can ... can other zoning techne... techniques do the
same thing? Yes. But they're not as direct about it, and the form based code is very
direct and open about it. Um .... and then in 2019, we .... so we took, we ... in 2018
we .... we started that work. We, um, started implementing that direction, working with
staff on, okay, what do you understand about these codes? We did a little bit of
education, um, because we found that over the years, if you simply just make one of these
and ... and give it to somebody, as clear as you think it is, it's not as clear (laughs) as you
think it is, and it's something that they may not have used before, and so they need a little
training on it. So we worked on that, as we started to make this new code, and then in
2019 we've been working on refining that code with them, and now starting to roll it out
and talk to owners. And so, urn .... at the end of 2019, or middle of 2019 actually, we
actually met with, um, before we released the draft, we meet with the, um, owners and
developers, urn .... and talked to them about this approach and got their feedback and
input. And so we went back and, um, and .... and made the code, but it was based on these
five points I wanna read. They said the process is lengthy and uncertain. They also said
that if the new process is more predictable (mumbled) they would actually entertain more
regulations. They wouldn't just entertain more regulations for the sake of it, but if...if it
made, if it ... uh, if it worked out that the process was more certain and more predictable,
and the risk was lower in getting something done, they would exchange that for more
regulations. Um .... the .... they also said, okay, we hear that there's a market for missing
middle housing, but we're concerned that there really isn't one, even though the market
analyst said there is. There was still some doubt. So, I'm just saying that because the
market analyst said there is a market, uh, I'll show you a slide in a second about that, but
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council and the
ICCSD joint meeting/work session of February 19, 2020.
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I just wanna convey that comment from them to you, that that's what they said. They
also said we needed more affordable housing choices. They agreed on that. Um, and
they, uh, talked about, uh, and these are stakeholders, uh, not necessarily developers.
They're both. They also said that the adjacency to Alexandler.... Alexander Elementary
needed to be improved. Um, so the market analysis, the ZimmermanNolk Associates is a
national market, um, analyst for this type of development, and they came to Iowa City
and their conclusions were these. That there is a market for, there's obviously a market
for single-family housing, right, but this question about the missing middle housing, is
there really a market for it in ... in Iowa City, and they said yes. They actually said that,
um, 49% of..of the market for the South District, for missing middle housing, was people
already living here in Iowa City. So that's really important to note that it isn't an influx
of 100% of people coming from out of town to Iowa City for this missing middle, uh,
approach. They said that, uh, just a little under half of buyers already live here. Um, and
they ...they broke it down like this, but they looked at about a thousand units over the first
five years for the whole South District, um, and that's .... they didn't say that had to be
developed. They're saying they could see that demand being .... being met, uh, needed,
and that, um, about 200 of those would be, like a fourth of those would be missing middle
housing, and that sort of bears out with the ... the zoning map that you're gonna see in a
little bit. I just wanna to ... touch on it here. We've taken that, um .... and .... and
interpreted it somewhat, but our approach is single-family houses will still be a bigger
mix of the total. They're probably three-fourths, 60%, you know, 60....60 to 70% of the
total mix of. ... of what can happen here, and about 20 to 25%, somethin' like that, is the,
um, is what we call the missing middle, the duplexes through the four-plexes and eight-
plexes. Um .... and you can see the information on .... on the market capture there.
They're thinking that rental would be up to 20 and for sale would be, urn .... uh, 15, per
year, of the....of the whole market .... in South District, that, uh, of Iowa City's market
capture, or market, 20% of it would be for sale, and 15....15% for sale, 20% for, uh, for,
uh, rent. And then after that April meeting we came back in November and had a
community meeting, reported all of this, urn .... out in the South District, at that beautiful,
um, community hall, I can't remember the name of it. It's on the lake there (talking in
background) Yeah, Terry Trueblood Park, yeah, beautiful and .... uh, so we .... we met with
people there, talked to `em about this process, uh, showed them what we had prepared at
that point, and got some feedback from them, and actually this was their feedback. Uh,
open space that's out there needs to be seen as an amenity. You know, it's out there in so
many places that have it turn their back on it and they put backyards of houses against it
or they don't consider it an amenity and just gets lost and .... and so they said it really
needs to be an amenity, and make sure the trails are ... are connected. Um, they also, um,
had a lot of concern, as a lot of existing neighborhoods do, about new
development .... (mumbled) with them, and so we .... we heard them and they .... they gave
ideas like one idea was keep it all a cornfield. Uh, that was one idea (laughs) Another
idea was put some kind of buffer between our houses and the new houses, and so a lot of
things in between too. So we took that feedback and .... and, uh, and I'll .... I'll explain
how we responded to that, uh, a little later. Um, they expected quality houses in
neighborhoods. They said whatever comes in here really needs to be high quality. Can't
be just somebody off-loading bad development in the South District. Uh, they're very,
very, uh, adamant about that, and then they also agree that affordable housing is needed.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council and the
ICCSD joint meeting/work session of February 19, 2020.
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Then we came, um, later in that trip and worked with developers and owners, and met
with them, and laid out a couple of different approaches. We said, you know, um, this is
1,700 acres. You either have to figure it all out, or you have to leave it to be figured out,
and maybe there's something in between. What do you guys wanna do? And so we
walked through three different options. We walked through low predictability in the
process. So you .... you get to figure it out and you go through a process and you can...
propose, um, a brand-new project every time, and you'll have to have meetings and the
...very low requirements in terms of the process, but who knows how long it'll be, and
who knows if you'll get through the process. So they said, no, that's sorta what we have
now. Then (mumbled) is well, we said we can draw a .... a map with a little more of the
street network and maybe some preliminary zoning but not very much, just very minimal
areas. Um, and you still have to go through some process, a .... a certain process, and they
said no, we .... that's another version of the one we already have. We don't want that.
Well the next one is number three, the more predictability version, which basically lays
out the whole street network, all the open space network, all the trails, everything and...
and the zones, and says this is ... this is the vision, this is the plan.... provided that you,
let's say you have a new idea three years from now or even a year from now, and you
wanna make the street go this way .... you wanna make a street go .... go this way that was
going that way. If you can meet the standards, this .... this code has the flexibility to
accommodate those changes, and they said that's the approach that we want. So what
we're going to show you tonight .... is based on that approach. We call it option one, the
most level of detail and the easier, uh, easier processing, because there's less to question,
and there's more certainty. So....,um.... (clears throat) excuse me. My, um, get all dried
out in this weather, sorry! Um, okay, so we talked about the input we received so far, but
on what? What is .... what is this code about? What is it making? Um .... here are
examples of what this code is aiming to make. Uh, we are not regulating architectural
style, but we're regulating form and relationship of the buildings to the street, the streets,
urn .... the height of buildings, all that. And one thing, if. ... if you take one thing away
from tonight, um, hopefully it's .... it's at least this. All of these buildings are house -scale
buildings, remember that term — house -scale buildings. There's.... there's basically two
categories of buildings, when you break it all down. There's house -scale buildings,
which are the size of houses, large and small, right? Those ... those are house -scale
buildings that might be a single -house or a four-plex or a duplex, but they're the size of a
house, house -scale, right? The other end of the spectrum is what we call block -scale
buildings, which are buildings that are always bigger than a house. And they might have
a .... they might have multiple units in `em, them might be commercial, they might be
office, they might be a hotel, but as soon as you get bigger than this, it's ... it's block -scale
building. This entire plan, this entire code, is all about house -scale buildings. Okay?
that's a really important thing to understand and ... and know. Um, so ... big takeaway on
these is that all the streetscapes are pedestrian -friendly, and by that .... one of the things
we mean is that obviously, you know, there's.... there are porches and entries facing the
street, and the setbacks are, um, not huge, uh, although we have a utility easement along
all the front of lots that .... makes us have a 10 -foot minimum setback no matter what.
That's 10 feet and then whatever you add to it. But you see that the garages aren't all
over the front. And, urn .... and so some .... some builders still wanna build that and that's
great because some buyers still want that. But more and more, people want
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council and the
ICCSD joint meeting/work session of February 19, 2020.
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neighborhoods that aren't dominated by garages on the streetscape. The garages are still
there. Look .... in the picture on the top left, do you see, um, on that orange building, you
see the car ... just behind that tree? There's a two -car garage right there. It's just set back
from the facade. So this code has requirements for how that ... that garage needs to set...
be set back. If it's a one -car, it ... it's set back a certain amount. If it's a two -car, it's set
back a little more. If it's a three -car, it's set back a little more, and the lot needs to get
wider to accommodate that. And that's a big change. I point that out because, um, that
....there's certain things in this code, and this approach, that are changes for the
development industry here in Iowa City, and you jut need to be aware of that. Um, so
...so there's neighborhoods like this. There are, um, so you're gonna hear the terms T-3
and T-4 and I'll explain that, but the first one you saw was a T-3 type of environment.
This is a T-4 environment. Where the first one is mostly single-family houses, with some
other things mixed in there like duplexes. This one, the T-4, is the opposite. It's
duplexes, four-plexes, townhouses, courtyards, and um .... and other choices, like a
cottage court, have you heard of that? So cottage court is like a lot, maybe 100 -feet wide,
with like maybe six or seven individual cottages arranged around a garden, or a pocket
neighborhood is another thing that people call them. So that's in here. Um .... but you
can see they're still all house -scale. They're not three-story buildings. They're all two-
story buildings. And then there's a small area that would be zoned Main Street. So I like
to say, uh, I know these pictures aren't of Dubuque, but I always use the example of
Dubuque Street, here in downtown, um, that one block stretch, from the Vetro on north,
you know, off of that pedestrian mall. That little stretch there, that little two-story block
stretch. That's a .... that's a small-town Main Street feel. That's what we're proposing for,
um, a one -block area, um, basically at McCollister and Sycamore, uh, and that would be
for this whole South District. So it would have its own little Main Street. It just wouldn't
compete with downtown, obviously. Urn .... so, and this is not new. There's... there's
actually, this is a development in Papillion, Nebraska that we're working on, and the
developer there, his name is Jerry Reimer, and the .... the project, um, the name of it is
Prairie Queen. It's, and there's, um .... there's 40 acres. I thought it was 60, I said earlier.
It's 40 acres, 600 units, and what he did there is he came to us and said I'm a multi-
family apartment developer and I'm .... I'm done. I don't wanna do it anymore. I'm sick
of it. I wanna do .... I don't wanna do single-family development, but I don't wanna do
multi -family development as I know it, and I've seen this thing missing middle. I ... what
about it? So he signed us up to design this neighborhood. There's not a house in it. It's
duplexes, four-plexes, six-plexes, eight-plexes, and then townhouses, and then there's a
little Main Street on the top left, and there's neighborhoods around it to the north and
west, and so he strategically put that little Main Street, basically in the center of a bigger
place. So it's off to the left of his project, but it's actually in the center of a bigger place
when you zoom out, and I show this to you because, um, he ... he's building 600 units
here. It's under construction, and it's doing well. People are saying, wow, we really like
the ... what you're getting is a smaller unit. People are trading in the single-family house
for a different lifestyle. Not everybody, but um, the market's millennials and empty -
nesters, and so they're saying, eh, I don't need the 3,00 -square foot house anymore. I
wanna.....I wanna live in a place like this. Um, and an important thing to point out is
the .... the efficiency, uh, the efficiency that single-family house builders count on is
similar in, um, in ... in these, uh, missing middle types. This ... this is a slide to simply
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council and the
ICCSD joint meeting/work session of February 19, 2020.
Page 7
show that I think there are eight building types, different options out there, and we
developed six unit types, and basically arranged them in different configurations to make
those different building options. So that way the builder knows, oh I have a palette of
unit types and I can use A and E to make a duplex, or A, B, and C to make a triplex, and
so on. But you don't have to reinvent them. So you've got six unit types designed and
he just mixes and matches them to create basically four-plexes, six-plexes, whatever it is.
And .... and makes different buildings. But you can see .... see how they're, urn .... they're
....they're house -scale buildings. They have the two stories and the third story's an attic.
The .... the features that this type of approach, urn ... uh, basically has is ... is these that I'm
gonna point out here, it's ... it's a walkable network of highly interconnected streets.
And ... and walkable means that there's somewhere you can walk to, um .... within walking
distance, and .... and you might say, well I can .... I can walk everywhere, but there might
not be something you can walk to, and so that might be a center. It might be like a
neighborhood comer with .... with, um, a cafe at it, or the Main Street, or, um, a little park.
There's always something you can walk to, or maybe it's nature and .... here at the edge of
the South District. Um .... there's a mix of street types. We call `em thoroughfare types,
but there's a mix of street types, and that's to make, if you look at really interesting
places, that are not all the same thing. Um, the public realm is very strong. The public
realm meaning the streetscapes outside. When you go outside of a building, you're in the
public realm and so that's always in these type of projects designed very well, very
nicely, and it connects it all. It's like a big fabric or big network to connect it all. Um,
and then storm water management. It's always integral as a feature, instead of being put
off to the side and ... and with a fence around it. When .... when you do this, people say,
well ... you know ,we have to collect storm water and manage it. Why don't we just make
it into a .... a system that is right along with streets or into parks, and we can actually see it
and the .... the buildings can front it and it's a feature, even when it's filled with water.
You can look at something. Um .... on -street parking and slower speeds. So the blocks
tend to be shorter and in an attempt to try and slow down traffic, because what we've
learned is that when the blocks get longer, people see the longer destination and they gun
it, and they go faster. I'm not saying people won't speed with shorter blocks, but they
tend to speed with longer blocks and that break point's about 600 feet. So anything over
600 feet, 700 feet, people are likely to speed. So in this code, the .... the len ... uh, the max
length is 600. Um, and then a mix of types that we've talked about, and then the strong
connection to the ground floor to the .... to the streetscape. So that's where a lot of
development, um, could go farther. So you have a really beautiful building, you have a
beautiful streetscape, but the ground floor wasn't designed to really match with that
streetscape, the way the entries and the way the doors connect to it. That's the missing
link in a lot of development. So this code has regulations for that called frontage types,
frontage standards. And then lastly the .... the Main Street we talked about. And here's an
example, I like this example, um, because it's relatively in the region and it's huge. It's
called New Town St. Charles. It's out of St. Louis, Missouri. Um, it's.... it's under
construction, uh, I think it's been under construction since, urn .... I wanna say 03, 04. It's
been under construction for 15 years, at least. And, um, and that's how much of it is
built, and it's really, uh, you should drive around Google Earth, check it out. It's .... it's
really interesting, um, and the way that they've used the storm water management system
to create a system of basically ponds, uh, to collect the water, and you can walk along
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council and the
ICCSD joint meeting/work session of February 19, 2020.
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(mumbled) and also the way that you can see the network is connected. This ... this plan
happens to have a lot of alleys. The one that we're proposing, because of developer
feedback, does not. Peop.....they could do alleys if they want to, but this code does not
require them. So let's talk about the code. Um .... this form based code, we're writing it
for the South District, but .... we .... we talked to the City about writing it in a way where if
you wanted also some day apply this to other greenfield areas, um, that aren't yet
considered, you could use this tool beyond the South District. So that you wouldn't just
silo it to those 1,700 acres. So they've.... they've done that. So when you read this, it's
not .... it doesn't say the South District code, and that's why. So that you could actually
take this and through a process map these zones in .... in yet to be determined areas in the
future. So you get more bang for the buck (laughs) Um, so how many of you have heard
of a transect? Okay! A couple of you. So the transect is basically a really simple system
that somebody came up with about 30....20 years ago, and they said, hey, urn .... we need
a simpler way to talk about development than we currently have. And so, um, this system
basically says there are, when you break it all down, when you talk over and over and
over and look at everything and boil it all down, there's basically six categories or...or
transect. Each is a category. Um, and so the first one is nature. T -I is nature. And you
have that right here at the edge of the South District. T-2 is the country, rural. T-3 is
basically neighborhoods that are mostly single-family houses, but have something within
walking distance to go to. So it's not a lot of suburbia. A lot of suburbia isn't T-3. T-3 is
most .... like your north .... North Side neighborhoods, the single-family portions of it,
where you have something to walk to in those older neighborhoods. That's ... a lot of that
is T-3. T-4 is the opposite. It's also some of your .... your North Side. It's mo .... it's some
single-family houses, but mostly four-plexes and duplexes and six-plexes and buildings
like that, house -scale buildings. We're still all talking house -scale. Okay? Then T-5 is
like a majority of your downtown. Big footprint buildings, whether they're a couple
stories tall or many stories, uh, usually it's about five or six, and then T-6 is like the
building across the street, with the big hotel, or the Hyatt Place, or, um, those other big
buildings, the big 10, 12 -story buildings. So let's show exam .... let's apply that to Iowa
City. So you see in the left-hand comer, a T-1. That's nature, right? It .... it doesn't mean
the development... that left a little park in the middle. It means nature. Green... green
areas, wetlands, all that, and ... and the South District, it's at the edge. You totally have it.
And then T-2 is farms and country. Not low-density residential, but farms and country.
Very different. T-3, again, we talked about them. Those are examples here in town, and
then you see T-4. Now look at T-5 and T-6. You see how much bigger they are than T-4
and T-3? You can just visually see that, right? Well, in the South District, we're only
talking about these. We're talking about nature, T-3, and T-4. We are not talking about
the others. Somebody .... uh, I think one of the .... one of the owners, uh, developers asked
today about essentially about a building that would be in the T-5 category, and we said
that has never been in the cards as far as we understand a vision for the South District.
Now, if that is changed, that's something, from a policy level, that we need to hear
because this code doesn't accommodate that. This plan does not accommodate that.
So .... urn ... so, yeah, just wanted to be super -clear, that's what we're talking about (laughs)
these three. So when you break it down, those six, it's really simple to understand, right?
Nature, T3, and T4, and .... and we can talk that way. It's... it's a lot simpler than urban
medium or residential high, it's like.... believe me, we've tried all that and it's .... it's just
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council and the
ICCSD joint meeting/work session of February 19, 2020.
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very hard to communicate with each other about that. Is it RL8, RL12, which ... which
one's more intense? It's way easier with T-3 and T-4, and T-1, so.... Um, so very
quickly, those zones with a little more detail. Here's the nature. It's no development.
If. ... if there's a utility building or some type of safety building that needs to happen out
there, obviously, but there's no development per se. It's nature. And we broke T-3 down
into two flavors. One is the edge, and you see it's two stories, and... instead of using
density and floor area ratio in this code, it uses building types. So it's like saying, um,
here's a duplex ... and, or here's a duplex and here's a four-plex. Are either of these
allowed in the zone? Yes or no. And so that's how this code works. It identifies all the
elements, all the types, and it tells you if they're allowed or not. In this zone, house,
duplex, and the cottage court are allowed. In the next flavor of T-3, there're a couple
more .... more options allowed. There at the bottom you see multiplex small. That's a
six-plex. And a townhouse small. I ... I gotta show you this .... this six-plex, to... to show
you something here .... before I forget. You see the building, um, middle right, you see
the blue and white building. Okay. How ...what do you think that is, anybody? You
probably know now what (mumbled) what ... whatdaya think that building is? (laughs)
(talking in background) What's that?
Teague/ It's a six-plex but it...
Salih/ ....multiplex (mumbled)
Perez/ It's a multiplex small. It's a six-plex, exactly! But the story (talking in background)
behind this is that, I was talking to the town architect, uh, last year and he said that he
loves showing that building because somebody came to him to buy a lot to build a house
in New Town St. Charles, and they said, yeah, take us around, show us what.... what we
can, um, buy and what you can design. Cause they design every building fresh there.
You come and .... and if it's a single-family lot they say here are the rules, but you tell us
what .... what colors you want. So they were walkin' around, and as they walked out of
his office and they walked down the street near this, he was showing them other buildings
over to the left and they said, whoa, whoa, stop! Design it like that! And he said that's a
six-plex.....at 36 units to the acre. And they said no way! (mumbled) said design our
house to look like that. So I just wanted to show you that .... that this thing, density and
all this other .... that we've been given as rules across the country, they don't really serve
us in communicating with each other. They looked at that and said, wow! Design us a
house and we can't even believe that that's a six-plex. It ... it feels so good, house -scale.
So, um .... just a little bit of a little story there. Um ... so those are the two flavors of T-3,
and then two flavors of T-4. You'll see that in a T-4 there are no houses allowed. Um,
this is cottage courts and (mumbled) and courtyard. And then this one only allows two
types. This, remember that of the whole mix, we're looking at probably six, like I said,
60 to 70% of the T-3 zones, which is mostly houses, and about 20 to 25% of the T-4 zone,
which h is not houses, okay? There's a mix across the whole place, but generally that's
the mix. So when you see the .... the four-plexes and the six-plexes and eight-plexes,
remember that is a .... a .... a ..... a fourth, um, about a fourth of the whole mix here. Uh,
and then the little Main Street area. And then obviously this code has use standards.
People think sometimes a form based code doesn't regulate land use, but it does. Uh, so
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certain uses are not allowed, or uses are only allowed to be a certain size. Um .... and then
one of the key factors in this code is that it has standards of how to make .... how to make
the blocks. Now that we're laying it all out, as you'll see, um .... they don't need to go
through a process to make the blocks, but they need to go through a process to show what
they intend to put on the blocks, and how they intend to design each block, which types
you're gonna put, um, based on the zone that's allowed. And then the street types. So
there are six street types that make the network, and frontage standards. So this is ... this is
probably one of the most important aspects of a form based code. So ... most of the time,
the connection between that private and the public is not really well thought out, and not
because people don't care. It just, they don't really know how connected those really are
and how big of an impact that relationship plays, and people just say, well it's just a
sidewalk and a parkway, how important can it be? Yeah, but how that entry connects to
the sidewalk makes it feel pedestrian -oriented or not. Right away, right? Uh, houses are
easy, but once you get up in like two or four-plexes or six-plexes, it makes a bigger
difference.... whether that building is pedestrian -friendly or not. Um .... so, the code has
standards, um, to talk about that, and ... and to identify the requirements. It gives you 10
different options, depending on where you are in the .... in the area, and here they are.
You can .... you can look at them online, but just to show you that they're .... the code has a
lot of photographs and diagrams to explain, okay, when we say porch, this is what we
mean. It's gotta be at least six -feet deep. It's gotta at least be eight -feet tall. Seems like
obvious stuff, right, but ... um, it's not (laughs) Um, civic spaces, are you gonna build a
plaza? Are you gonna build a greenway? It tells you the dimensions, uh, and where
those things are allowed. Okay .... what do these two buildings have in common?
Anybody? Don't think about it too long, just ... it really should just pop out to you
(laughs) If you .... if you say nothing (several talking) Height! They have the height.
Well, one's three stories and one's two. (several talking)
Salih/ They look the same!
Perez/ Uh, yeah, because of the scale. Yeah! Well so check it out, the density's almost identical.
So the ... density, you hear people talk about that a lot, right? You hear people say we
don't want the density, don't increase the density. Density is the wrong conversation to
be having. It's about building size and what's in each building, cause the building on the
left is 175 -feet long, three stories tall, and has 60 units. The building on the right is 40 by
65, and has only two stories, with five units, and yet numerically, they're the... almost the
same density by one. I could make this 30/30, but that's not the actual density. Like
somebody would look it up and call me and say, it's 29, Tony (laughs) so, I put 29, but do
you see .... I don't know if you have conversations about this, but most cities do and this is
not the argument to be having, cause what happens is you could .... you could settle on a
number, but if you don't want the building on the left in your neighborhood, you didn't
prevent it by the density. It's building footprint, building size, that's .... and that's what
this code .... you'll hear people say, wow! We looked through this thing and it really
regulates building footprint and ... and size, and we're not used to that. That's why.
Because if you don't regulate that, by the best intentions, you could end up with the
building on the left, and the building on the left has nice units on it. That's not ... that's not
to say the building on the left is wrong. It's just not for the South District. So ... um, and
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again, so we ..... we provide standards for that, and in this case there're 11 building types.
We've talked about them, from single-family house all the way up to ... to, um, Main
Street buildings.
Teague/ Back to the ... I had one question about the last.....
Perez/ This one?
Teague/ I...one more! So, um, just for living space, like what would be the square footage for
living space, you know, between the two buildings?
Perez/ So the units in the .... in the five, uh, unit building that ... the one on the right's actually
called a mansion apartment. That's the building type it's called. That one has, uh, five
units and they're pretty big. They're like 1,200, 1,400 -square foot units. Yeah, and you
can see the building go back there. It's not that big of a footprint, so they're.... they're
big, they're flats. And the building on the left has a variety of them, basically from 800
to, oh, probably 1,800, somethin' like that. Yeah. Yeah, my mom was looking at one in
the building on the left. That's how I know that. Yeah. Yeah, so it ... but look at the
building footprints? Just look ... look at the size of the building in the aerial. You can see
the whole thing. So .... unit size is important, but building footprint, like how, you know,
how big it is on the ground. How big would the foundation be, that ... that's what's really
important too, because people focus on density and height. Meanwhile they're missing
the bigger question about the footprint. Um, and .... and I'm not saying we're geniuses
(laughs) I didn't realize it for a long time either! (laughs) You know, you just realize
these things you go, whoa! So I'm not saying I knew it the first day I started doing this.
I did not. Um .... then there's this other thing about controlling the form that it's an
approach that's older than any of us in the room, and it's called `main body and wings.' It
precedes all of us, and if you look at older buildings, you'll see a main body and then
you'll see a smaller portion that comes out of it, as awing. Really well-designed older
buildings, they always did this. And so we're showing several options here connected to
garage locations, but ... so there're two things being shown here, but this is simply to show
you that this code controls the .... the darker, um, square on the .... in the diagrams, that
gray, that's the main body and so the main body can be moved around in the lot, as long
as you meet the setbacks, and then you can grow that footprint, but with a smaller wing.
So ... right now, if you have a two-story building, you can't just extrude more two stories.
You have to put a one-story wing if you want to grow it. So you can have more floor
area, but you can't extrude the whole thing over the whole lot, and that .... that's a subtlety
that's lost in most zoning codes. Most zoning codes just say lot coverage, building
height, and density or floor area ratio, and this is really helpful, because.... that building
that we were just talking about, this guy on the right .... what's gonna keep it from getting
bigger, or than a standard saying you can't make it bigger? And if you wanna make it
bigger, you can add a wing to it. But ... cause if you don't do that, people will make `em as
big as possible, for efficiencies. It's not anything malicious. Yeah, so.....yeah, there was
a picture I was just showing it. So again, the .... the main body on that big building to the
left is very large, and the main body on the building on the right is house -scale. Okay, so
the regulating plan. We talked about the three options with the developers. We....we, uh,
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explained the three different levels of detail and they chose option 1, uh, which you can
see a preliminary plan we presented last, uh, last fall, and you can see the ... the drawing
here. Um .... there, those are the two other levels, see that? So then taking the level one
approach, which they asked for, we went further and developed that into more
re .... accurate blocks and streets, um, to show what actually fits on each property, and
then depending on where it is, we applied, um, the zones, and that's... this is the first time
we're showing this and we showed it to the owners this morning. So we're looking for
feedback on that. Again, the T-3, uh, zones are mostly houses with a couple other types
in there, and the T-4 is opposite. Okay? And I ... and I just wanna say again for clarity, the
T-3 is about 60 to 65%, 70%, and the T-4 is probably 20, 25, something like that. Um....
Teague/ As far as, um, financial makeup of what it would cost to be in this area, cause I think we
have the School Board here. I think it'd be important for maybe some conversation
throughout, just to talk about a ... affordability with this type of mix. Um, and the
integration of what it could look like with higher and lower, uh, economic status
individuals livin' within this community.
Perez/Yeah, um (mumbled) so for example, if you look at the, um, the T-3 zones and you think of
that as where the houses are, the majority of the mix there, urn .... it's up to .... it's up to
you and the developer to .... uh, to offer the houses for certain size and certain
affordability. I mean we can't regulate that. But the affordability's gonna come, uh, in
everything but the houses, for sure, and the houses you can only do so much, but like
duplexes and four-plexes and six-plexes, that's gonna provide more affordable units, just
because of the smaller footprint that you ... that you ... you can make them in, and those are
in mostly in the T-4 zones. Um .... you know, so .... I warm be very clear that none of the,
um, yeah, we can't regulate affordability, but we're trying to accommodate it by
providing the different building types as a way to do that, as opposed to just saying words
and numbers. So you .... you can look at it and say, you know what, I really hope
somebody builds something that's of duplexes and four-plexes, as .... as an affordable, uh,
affordable project. Or .... and that's the other thing, if you look at the blocks here, there is
no .... development project. There're boundaries, right, but it all weaves into each other
and you can't .... at, ultimately it's like downtown, in the .... in the North Side, you can't
tell where one boundary ends and one boundary begins, and so it's really a great.... that's
the way cities have been made forever, right? So ... maybe one half of a block, let's see,
can I blow this up? No. One half of a block, like let's say this is the street, and this half
of the block facing the street and you're the other half of the block facing the street. That
could be one project. And it could be an affordable project in the T-4 that is either
townhouses or four-plexes, you know, or even six-plexes. You could do that kinda thing,
or you could .... say some communities say, uh, a certain percentage of a .... of a project
needs to include X percent of. ... of affordable units, but yeah, the ... this code doesn't
regulate. It simply just accommodates it.
Teague/ For....what is .... what is the (several talking) Oh, what is the difference between T-5 as
far as like building scale and like, you know, we .... in T-4 is four-plex, six-plex, because I
don't see any six-plex or five-plexes in this area. So what would be the max plex or...
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Perez/ Right. Um, so let's go here. Yeah, so buildings, um, I don't know if you can see that on
your screen, but you see, um, here's, uh, we have two types of houses. I'll just begin
here. This is a house, what we call a large house, and this is a small house. This is a
duplex, uh, side-by-side. This is a duplex that's stacked. Uh, and you probably have
seen these types. Um, this is a cottage court. This is really affordable. You put a little
garden in the middle. Let's say the garden is a little narrower than this room, and then
you put little one -bedroom or two-bedroom, very small two-bedroom units, around it and
maybe parking in the back, or parking on the side, and um, I can tell you in California, in
the early 1900s when the movie studios were getting going, that's exactly what they did.
Los Angeles is filled with these because there were people that were coming out from the
Midwest and the east and they couldn't afford a lot, so they needed a small place to live,
but they needed to live close to the action, close to their job, so you saw the studios build
a lot of these cottage courts, all over Los Angeles. L.A. claims they invented it. I don't
know if they did, but that's what they say. Um, so the cottage court is .... is, um, is, uh,
very affordable for what it gets on the lot, um, and then this is the multiplex small. It
goes up to six units, so that's a six-plex. Here's a multiplex large. This goes up to 12.
Uh, these are townhouses. This is a courtyard, which goes up to 16. And then this is a
Main Street building, that could have maybe .... it depends on the size of the building, but
it could have units above. Yeah. So the ... the courtyard is up to 16 and the multiplex large
is up to 12. Those are the higher ones, and then the six-plex here. And I don't talk much
about the....the 12 and the 16 because they're only allowed in the ... in the highest zone T-
4 neighborhood medium, and, uh... it's a choice. So again, we don't even know if you'll
see it, but um, but those are the two higher ones. Yeah. Does that help answer the
question?
Teague/ Yes!
Salih/ And which one is T-5 here then? The last one?
Perez/ None of those. (several talking) Remember this whole code is written for T-3 and T-4.
Salih/ Okay.
Perez/ So that's a good question. Let me go back to that real fast. If we were writing this code
for T-5 .... we would .... we would need to write, you see the buildings in the second-hand
to the right column? We would need to write rules for buildings like that. Look at the
bottom, the bottom row ... um, you see that five -story building?
Perez/ Okay, that's T-5.
Salih/ That's big one.
Perez/ Yeah, and .... and it's not just the height. It's .... it's their footprint, how big they are. So
you're a little house (laughs) and there's.... there's a certain balance. At some point you
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say wow, that's too big .... across the street from me, and the T-5 buildings are huge.
They..... that's the other thing. Remember the .... the terms house -scale and block -scale?
Block -scale buildings can be as big as a block, or most of a block. So that's an easy way
to just go that's too big next to houses, or may .... maybe you don't think that, but at least
that's.... that's the approach we use. Yeah. Does that answer the question?
Salih/ Yes.
Perez/ Okay.
Eastham/ Bruce, uh, I might comment on your question. Um .... I'm not going into this expecting
that this ... it's a, if you decide to adopt this kind of a regulatory development plan, is
going to produce very low-income, uh, affordable housing. Uh, I'm thoroughly
convinced that new construction is not the way to get housing that's affordable to people
under 20, $25,000 a year income. That's... that's not gonna work. I think it does produce
a much, with much bigger certainty, a much number .... a larger number of homes within,
one, a mile to a mile and a half of the front door of an elementary school, and to me that's
a more interesting, uh, and more of worthwhile outcome than thinking that this is going
to produce very low-cost housing.
Perez/ Yeah (both talking)
Eastham/ If you don't agree with that, Mr. Perez (both talking)
Perez/ No, that's.... that's right on, I mean the balance with these kinds of projects, um, it's ... it's a
double-edged sword. On the one hand, uh, people say they're too nice, because the
values go up (laughs) and on the other hand people say the values went up, you know, so
we didn't want the values to go up cause my taxes went up. You know (laughs) we don't
know how to make codes for, uh, development that would be mediocre or bad. So these
projects, because.... because they tend to offer environments that are in short supply, or
are more appealing than the environments around them, they .... they tend to go up in
value. Um, we are not proposing to regulate this to, I mean even though we have a lot of
regulations, we're not regulating architecture, uh, like we did in the Peninsula. We're not
doing that. So ... that .... that's another, like if you got down to that level of. ... of
specificity, then you'd, yeah, you are .... going into another.... another arena, but we're not
proposing that here. Yeah. Like New Town St. Charles, the .... they did that, they said for,
I think for a majority of that ... that code, um, they have a town architect that reviews
everything. Down to the eaves. And, yeah, we're not proposing that. (laughs) Yeah. So
we just think that if you have the right scale buildings, in ... in the right place in the lot,
and it sounds obviously, like well where else could it go on the lot? But how does the
parking work? Does the parking dominate the streetscape? Or do porches and .... and
buildings dominate the streetscape? All those little simple things, if you regulate those, it
makes a good place, regardless of how good the architecture is. That's... that's been our
approach from day one on this. We are not going crazy on architecture. It's not ... it's not
necessary. Um .... and then the last slide is just next steps, uh, so ... we are, urn .... we are
here in early 2020, getting feedback on this .... on this draft, um, and um .... all the
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feedback that we get and direction we get, we're gonna go back and make the public
draft, and we expect that sometime in the spring, urn ... uh, late spring, that this might be
ready for, um, you know, public.... public, uh, consideration, like adoption in summer.
Uh, we'll finish the public draft probably April, Mar .... end of March, something like that.
Um .... but I just wanna .... I just wanna, uh, point something out also about the process
that is rare, but really good in this case. Most communities, when they go through a
process like this to make any type of a code.... small or large, they hold back the draft, the
work with us for a year, two years, three years .... on this, before they let the public see it,
because they're concerned that once it gets out, people will read it and go, well, you
didn't have all this figured out so we're upset, and .... and sot that, you know, that's their
reasons, not a mean reason. It's just they wanna make sure it's all air tight. And what we
told the City early on is we said that's almost impossible, you know, with .... with so much
content. Yeah, you don't want to produce a draft that the public reviews (mumbled) We
wouldn't do that. But you want the ... the public review on this sooner than later. So the
City took a really good step and said, yeah, that's a great way to go. We're gonna release
the administrative draft. So this is the initial administrative draft. We're gonna put that
out so people can see it, because if you don't, what happens is people will .... anxiety
raises on ... on a number of different levels, uh, might be different for you, different for
you, and so on, and so ... they've taken that advice and ... and so that's to let you know, this
is out a year sooner than normally would be, and we're getting a lot of good feedback as
a result of it, and .... and collaboration, not people coming to a meeting and saying `had to
wait two years for this, you know, I'm really mad.' So that's been really, really effective,
and we can, you know, open it up and people have their questions (laughs) hey, that's a
great observation, you know, and we've already, um, made some internal, um .... uh,
changes like, hey, that's a better way to say that statement or that number is .... is better
stated this way, you know, stuff like that. Um, so .... I just wanna thank the City for ...for
doing that, for .... your taking that step, cause that's not.... that's not normal and it should
be. I'll go sit down (laughs) if you guys wanna talk.
Teague/ Well, any questions for (both talking)
Weiner/ Does .... does this plan include .... (mumbled) alleyways?
Perez/ So alleyways are not required, but they're allowed.
Weiner/ Okay, because alleyways essentially, at least as far as I understand it here, really up...
increase the cost, both in terms of construction and then the ... whoever the owner is is
responsible for the upkeep.
Perez/ Yeah. A ... a lot of these, um, projects do include alleys, because it's a more efficient use of
the land, you know, of the lots on the block, but um, you can do `em without `em. So this
code is written either way — you can do them or you can choose not to.
Bergus/ I have a really broad, general question ... is to put you on the spot (both talking)
Perez/ (laughs) Oh oh!
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Bergus/ Um, both of, yeah! Both of the governing bodies up here have, um, prioritized climate
action in .... in different ways, and so for us to release this to the public and to talk about
what we're trying to do in being proactive in development in this huge greenfield area. I
think we need to make sure we're.... framing that and understanding that. So can you just
talk at us a little bit about what .... what elements of a plan like this can help make sure
that the development is responsible and sustainable.
Perez/ Yeah, um....so.....uh, first of all, I'm not a climate action ... or a climate action expert, but I
know that this pattern, the pattern of, um, compact and walkable development is less
conducive, or .... or it would.... doesn't prevent car trips, but it's .... it's conducive to less
car trips, and because of its inner, uh, the interconnectivity, it sounds like a real fancy
word. I hate to even say it, uh, let me say it another way. Because of how many streets
connect, rather than how .... how few streets connect. You have more options, and you're
more likely, uh, you're more likely in these kinds of ...of projects to see a dispersal of
traffic rather than a concentration. One of the reasons you see concentration of traffic in
suburbia is because there're fewer route choices. Everybody's on that same street,
getting to that same signal, and you're all there, and that intersection has to be widened
huge ... in a huge way. That produces more car trips and people are sitting there idling.
And these kinds of. ... of projects, the idea is ... that, that's why we call it walkable. The
idea is to have something to walk to, and whether it's nature, uh, or something else,
ideally it's these kind of Main Street areas and, uh, we would like to have like .... let me
show you. You see .... I don't know if you can see it, you see, um .... do you see me
pointing on this? Yeah. Okay, you see these areas that have this little line going across,
these little hatched areas? Okay, they're dispersed across, and here's the Main Street,
right? Well you see these areas, these are intended as the centers or the focal points of
each of those neighborhoods, and ideally they would have a little green and they would
have maybe, um, a small couple stores there, or as much as that area could support, so
that you have something to walk to. That's how this is designed to be used. We just are
not forcing it through regulation on the ... on the developers. We're en .... encouraging it
and saying, hey, you can even increase your walkability more. So to answer your
question, Laura, um .... the walkability .... is .... is, um .... is enhanced by having something
to walk to and not having to get in your car to go on every trip. We're not denying people
that will own cars or that will use them. We're simply saying that if you had something
to walk to, five, seven, 10 minutes away, those worth walkin' to, that wasn't just more
houses, that's where you put these. So those hatched areas actually allow these owners
other uses that aren't allowed elsewhere in that same area. It's called an open sub -zone.
So it means if you have a list of uses, let's say it's 10 uses. And retail and other, uh,
services are not allowed, because it's a neighborhood, in those areas they are allowed. So
the open, it's like a little valve, you open it and you say in these hatched area you're ... you
owner, developer, are allowed these other uses. So .... please take advantage of that, and
let's say that .... let's say that the owner says well you know I sold my property and I only
own up to here and the .... and the developer here didn't want to do this. If it's unused,
let's just move it up here, and put the center up here. So those hatched areas are intended
to be those walkable destinations that .... that are .... not necessarily this Main Street,
and ... and so anyway the walkability, the .... the high connection of streets, and .... and, um,
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trails, um, produces a dispersal of traffic and produces more route choices,
and.... over .... I mean, again, you've gotta have the destinations to walk to, but if this is
built this way, you decrease the number of car trips.
Teague/ I have a question, uh, two questions about, uh, one about universal design. Is there even
a percentage of, uh... you know, what ... what type of, um, consideration have you all done
for universal design, and the second one is related to, um, essentially the setbacks for the
garages, if it's one, two, or three. Is there any options for entry from the garage into the
home?
Perez/ Yeah. Great question. So on the universal design, um, all the pictures and the diagrams
give the impression that you have to raise your foundation. You can. You're not required
to. So we ... we are allowing zero -grade entry everywhere. So, if you want to raise your
foundation, like let's say you do a single-family house, and you wanna have a raised
foundation or you .... you wanna raise your pad a little bit and you just build on a slab,
you can do that. Urn .... so .... uh, yeah, universal design, zero entry, it's everywhere. The,
urn .... the question about, um, the garages, yeah, so .... so this code doesn't require you to
detach or attach your garage. It's silent on that, and we realize that that's caused some
questions. So today we had a lot of discussion about making that more explicit, that just
saying it — it can be attached or detached — it's up to you as a.....as a builder, as an owner,
urn ... you know (mumbled) delivering these... these buildings, um, and the .... the garage
can be .... as.....as long as the garage is set back, like we were saying. I ... I don't have the
slide here, but basically if the garage... what... what we came up with today is a simple
rule. Right now we have a parking setback line, but that seems to be a little too much.
So what we came up with today, or last couple days.....when we presented to the owners
today, is t his simple concept. If, urn .... if this is your facade, and you wanna put a one -
car garage here, the depth of the setback is the width of the garage (turning away from
mic) with a 45 -degree angle, from the front of your house. So you draw a 45 -degree
angle and go to the ... the width of one -car garage, that ... that's the setback you need to
have. You wanna put a two -car, it has to be a 45 -degree angle to the two, and so on, and
that way you ... you determine by your choice of how many cars you wanna park on a
front -facing garage, how big the setback is.
Teague/ So the only thing that I see with the setback, I .... I hear the concept and I .... I agree with
the visibility from the street and that type stuff. It makes it more, urn .... you see more
house than anything. You see a (both talking)
Perez/Yeah!
Teague/ ....but I do see the option of the setback givin' a little more, um, concrete, urn ... and also
takin' away from green space, potentially, that could be in the backyard, on the back of
the (both talking)
Perez/ Yeah.
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Teague/ ....on the, you know, on the back side. So that's .... when I hear that, I just see it's less
usable space for outdoor activity, urn ... it would go from, um, it would decrease concrete,
which is, urn .... you know, and .... and provide more of...more green space, which is
more .... you know, climate action friendly. The other, uh, thing that I just wanted to make
mention is you mentioned, um, as far as like zero -grade entry. I think that's good for
universal design. But can you talk any .... any other elements to universal design? Um,
that .... as .... as far as like the design of like the .... the inside of the spaces. Is ... is there any
considerations, or of like .... for universal design?
Perez/ Uh... not at the moment. We're not regulating the inside of the space. The current codes
that you already have in place would do that. We're .... we're not proposing to, uh, we
haven't been asked to regulate the interiors.
Teague/ Okay.
Perez/ I ... I just put these diagrams up, Mayor, about the parking. Uh, the ... the one on the left
shows a garage off of an alley, which again is allowed, not required. Um, the one ... the
second one is a garage with a side drive, you know, going down the side. Um, the third
one is a garage that's detached, in the back, and then the fourth one, um, is .... is another
version of the second one, um, showing that it's attached, but we were just discussing
these today, about ways that you can attach the garage to the building, and how many
garages you would choose is up to you, but the lot has to get wid.... if you want `em all
front facing, the lot has to get wider. We had a discussion with, um .... uh, developer, uh,
owner, uh, just before this meeting, and it was almost all about this, and um ... and we
were looking at the floor plan that ... that he had and ... and the garage plan and trying to
figure out ways to use that again, because one of his comments was, well, I have to make
new floor plans, and....and I think that, um.....(sighs) you know, as ... as we mentioned to
him, the approach here is ... is different, not just to garages, but the whole development.
It's different, and that's what we were asked to do. And so .... we, um, if we are off on
that, if we are off on the direction that this is supposed to be going in, then we need to
know that, cause we ... we (laughs) made a whole code to go ... it's ... it's not like we're
making alien buildings here that nobody would recognize. It's just certain things are
changing. Like you can't put a three -car garage on the front of the lot, you know, and
have the house behind it. That ... that's not how this is working. Um, like we said to him,
you can still have a three -car garage. You just need to make your lot wider or re ... or .... or
we .... we gave him ideas to use his existing floor plan and turn it around and ... and remove
it from where it was, but to take his existing floor plan, as it is, and drop it on one of these
lots, yeah, wouldn't meet the standards, but it doesn't mean it can't be molded to ... to fit.
You know? So I think of it as more of a philosophical, uh, divide rather than a technical,
cause technical we coulda figured it out, or we can figure it out, I would say. Yeah.
Salih/ I just wanna ask you for the ... for the stepback, like for three like space for garage or for
two or even for one, and you said it depended on like if you need one car you (mumbled)
little bit, if you need three cars you gonna have more of a stepback. Uh, when you said
like more stepback for three -car, is that means the house is bigger than the other house
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that have two or .... it doesn't matter the size of the house, they could have like more
space, more garage?
Perez/ Yeah, it ... it's .... the, urn ..... where's that picture I wanna show you? Yeah .... uh, let's see
here. It's right here. The top left, you see that garage?
Salih/ Yes!
Perez/ ...setback? It's a two -car garage, um, and the cars parked in front of it and you can see the
curb cut is a one -car curb cut, you see that, and then it flares out, um .... so .... to answer
your question,the house can get as big as the standards allow it go get.
M"OTMOVIM101
Perez/ The garage .... has to fit within the setbacks too. The .... the difference is is that, um, people
have been used to putting the garage inside the footprint of the house (noises on mic,
difficult to hear) and putting the house around the back, putting the house around the
back, and so they ...they haven't had to deal with that, but basically this code is saying you
can have all the garage you want. That's not the problem. The problem is .... we, well not
the problem, but the shift is we want you to use the house to be the dominant element in
front, not the garage, and that's the shift in philosophy and approach. Um ... so, again, you
know, what we .... what we tell cities is, um .... as.....as this developer told us, people still
want this and we told him, yeah, people.... people still want this, but they also want this.
So people wanting that big garage approach... three -car garage approach, or two, you
know, with a dominant garage, maybe they need to just look in another area of Iowa City
to buy that house, because this area is, at least the direction we've been given and
the ... the approach we're taking is to not do that. So that choice will still be allowed and
we're not denouncing that choice. We're just simply saying that's not in this .... in this
palette of...of options.
Weiner/ With respect to retail, the ... what's in the Peninsula has really struggled, um, the ... and
retail I think often depends on the size the community that surrounds it (both talking)
Perez/ Yeah.
Weiner/ Uh, the ... is, would this area be large enough to support any retail truly, so that you could
have those, um, walkable destinations?
Perez/ Yeah, that's a great point. Another reason I think it struggles is it's at the end of a street.
It's basically a cul-de-sac neighborhood, right? It's not .... there aren't cul-de-sacs in it.
I'm saying it's a dead-end neighborhood. There's nothing coming to it from the other
way to .... for more traffic or customers, right? You have to go to it, and go around it, and
you're likely not to do that unless you live there, and .... and there's probably not enough
people living there. Um, Bob Gibbs is a retail, uh, expert out of, uh, Lansing or
Dearborn, Michigan, I can't remember right now. Anyway, he .... he says that it takes, and
he just put a....a, uh, a blog post out this ... about two days ago. He actually said the
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number. There was a range of households or rooftops, as he put it, and I don't wanna
misquote him but he put a number out there. We've got more than that number out here
(laughs) And plus this is not a dead-end! You've got McCollister connecting all of Iowa
City with the South District. So you're gonna have people coming to east and west,
and ... or down Sycamore to go to McCollister, or out of town, right, or coming back north,
coming north on Gilbert you might make a right on, um, on, uh, Sycamore makes a turn
(laughs) you know what I mean, and then come up. So this .... the South District is not,
um, is not the similar situation to Peninsula. Peninsula is in a comer, and you can't get
to it except you go in that corner, as good of a project as it is. The South District is not
that. Yeah, but that's a good point. I .... I'm .... I'm hesitating on giving you the number,
because I don't wanna be quoted wrong, but, uh, look it up on Bob Gibbs, `rooftops for,
um .... for a walkable retail.' He just put it out like two days ago and if I find it, I'll give it
to Anne and she can circulate it to you. Um, the .... the number, I will say this, he used to
say, um, 16, uh, unit per acre average, is what was needed to have enough people in an
area to support walkable retail. Um, and that translates to a certain number of population
based on your population numbers, but the other day he put it out more clear than that.
So...
Bergus/ With the 1,700 acres of this area, do you have, uh, sort of minimum and maximum based
on the forms that are allowed for what the number of units could be?
Perez/ We ... we have ... we haven't done that. Um, you know, if you look at, um projects like, uh
New Town St. Charles, or even the small one that we're doing, the 40 acres in Nebraska,
they tend to range from... overall gross, uh, if you just take the whole area and realize
what they did, as opposed to using this number I'm going to give you as the beginning.
Like when they put it all in, and the .... the gross number that comes out is anywhere
between 10 and 15.
Bergus/ Units per acre?
Perez/ Yeah.
Bergus/ Okay. And ... (both talking)
Perez/ ...but that's different than a zoning code saying 10 to 15 to the acre. It's a whole different,
uh, calculation. Once you finish one of these, like one area might be 42 to the acre, and
one might be seven, and one might ... or 36. Like I was showing you that ... that six-plex is
36 to the acre mathematically. But the whole project of New Town St. Charles, is, um, it
comes in about 10.
Bergus/ So the map that you showed that has like the green spaces and a new roundabout and the
different commercial areas (both talking)
Perez/ You mean at the end, the regulating plan?
Bergus/ Yeah.
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Perez/ Yeah, okay.
Bergus/ Yeah! So ... I know you mentioned there'd be some flexibility, but let's .... let's say we
acknowledge we would need an additional school, right, so where .... where would that
go, how would you decide where that goes, do you make that recommendation? If we're
actually mapping out the streets, you can see Alexander right where your cursor is. Um
.....it's a significant chunk of. ... of land that would be designated. How do you ... plan for
that or do you?
Perez/ Well first we haven't planned for it because every time we've asked about a school, um,
we've heard nothing. We've hea.... we haven't heard that a new school is being
contemplated. So, um (both talking)
Eastham/ ...no fair (laughs)
Perez/ So .... so the first, the first thing to do is know if one's needed, and we've heard to date that
one wasn't being contemplated here, but there was one needed but maybe elsewhere in
town. That's what we've hard so far, and then .... if ...if you knew that one was here, well
what kind of school? Is it high school? Is it a .... a, um, elementary school? Is, what is it?
Is, you know, so .... because they have acreage minimums I would imagine, and then the
other thing is what is the school looking for? Are they looking to be ... uh, near few
neighbors, or do they care, do .... do you wanna attach it to the existing school? All kinds
of things, I mean, it ... it, so we need to ... in order to answer your question, we have a lot of
questions (laughs)
Bergus/ Got some folks here who could probably start to answer them!
Godwin/ Well, and I'm not sure we can do complete justice to the level of detail that is coming
up, but we will be doing another review of. ... enrollment projections, based on
developen... developments that are in the works and .... and we could go through this
process regularly and I think we've got one coming up, which would contemplate this
proposed plan and the number of units, number of households, the projections for
elementary school children ... I'm just, we haven't discussed, um, where we would have
a .... a school in this area, in addition to Alexander. Um, I would think it'd be highly
unlikely it would be another high school, for example. It most likely would be an
elementary school, depending on what the demographics and the population looks like,
but again, we've not had any detailed conversations about this at the School Board level.
We've gotta go through that next, uh, projection of...of enrollment to understand where
the growth in the .... in the district will be. And this is just one .... one municipality in our
five municipality district, and so we take all of those accounts into ... to bear when we
look at the need for additional schools.
Eastham/ It would seem to me like the ... Council could give us a lot of help by, urn .... either
adopting this development plan, or saying you're not gonna adopt it, so we'll ... you know,
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in deciding about where, uh, school children are gonna be located over the next 10 years,
uh, that'll give us some better things to go on. I mean....
Bergus/ Well I guess, um, Tony, does the ... does the plan allow for that, what is the flexibility that
would allow for placement of a school, I mean if it's 1,700 acres, at an average of 10
units an acre, regardless of the demographics, I would think that would be enough
households to warrant.... something somewhere, in terms of an additional school.
Perez/ Yeah, and again on the 10 per acre, that ... that is a ... let us .... let us, I just really wanna make
sure on, you know, whoever's watching this and.... and.... that is a general (laughs) rule of
thumb. We have not applied that here, so I don't want people that walk away and go,
man, that guy said 15,000 units or something. It .... there's a lot of things that ... that, um,
that bear on that. For example, what we heard to date from the owners and developers is
that they prefer.... maybe somebody five years from now will say different, but these
owners and developers prefer a higher mix of houses than the four-plexes and six-plexes
and 12-plexes. So that number, that 10 per acre, has a lot to do with more of the 12-
plexes being involved. So if fewer of those are involved, that number may get ... go down
to four, or five per acre, across the whole project. I just really wanna temper that number
that we have not prepared yet. We don't, you know, we .... we can go back and do that,
but we just thought it was premature. We needed some feedback. Um, but still, yeah,
there's a .... more people that'll be living here for sure. Um, in terms of how to
accommodate it, again it's like any of this process. We've worked with the owners, um,
given them our rec.... our professional recommendation on the design for—for their ...their,
um, their land, and put down zones, and it's the same with .... with anybody else. If the
School District came forward, I mean the current process doesn't include that. We ... we
don't, you know, we don't have anything in our scope that says `go work with the school
board' to put a new site here and figure it out.
Godwin/ And I ... and I don't think that's what the process would be.
Perez/ Yeah (both talking)
Godwin/ .....we collect up what, uh, projections for new growth, new development, what the...
what the planned number of households are, and we put that into our planning. I mean,
first to build a new school we'd have to go acquire the property, you know, it's
subsequent or around the ... the development, if it made sense and could sustain a school.
So there's a much larger process there. I don't think that's incumbent upon you to (both
talking)
Perez/ Yeah (both talking)
Godwin/ ...to think about that.
Perez/ I will ... I just wanna say one thing about it, is that, um, the way that this plan is
constructed, with all the blocks and then the network like that, it's .... it's like cells. So if
you look at where, if you wanted to put something here, you could look at those cells and
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say, oh! We need six cells, four cells, instead of carving out some weird shape, but then
makes the remainder properties pretty unusable and hard to use. Look at them as cells,
and blocks that you could co ... um, combine into your site, if that's what you're gonna do.
Bergus/ And are schools allowed in any transect?
Perez/ Yeah, uh, it's .... it's, again, we didn't .... we .... we heave not heard anything about a school,
so right now the school isn't even mentioned. It, like you....
Bergus/ (both talking) ....adopt something that would prohibit the (both talking)
Perez/ Well, yeah ... I mean, yeah (both talking) right now, uh, a new school is not contemplated,
so the rules don't reflect that. They do .... they do reflect, like, you know, small studios
and things like that, as .... as a school use, but as a school, on a ground, no. Except for the
one that's there. Yeah.
Roesler/ And, honestly, Laura, one of the biggest things that would impact, uh, us not knowing
the number of children that are there, but it's the economic status of the children that
make up the way that we do it, because there's .... if you took, we have the RAM model,
which I'm sure you've heard and are pretty familiar with. If this is a RAM four, or what,
two school, Alexander? (mumbled) our numbers go. (talking in background) Two!
Right? But if it was a five, then that.... there's like 200 more kids that could go there, and
there's space for that there. So I mean it's.. just, you know, that's gotta have a .... an
impact on how ...we currently operate, boundary wise though. (mumbled)
Williams/ I also hard you say earlier in your presentation that some of the demand, some of the
market demand from this is from millennials and empty -nesters. It seems a category that
don't have children.
Perez/ Right.
Williams/Are you ... is, are you able to project.... with any more detail (laughs) you know, like
35% of the projected lots would be homes suitable for.... families with school -aged
children.
Perez/ Yeah, the ... the market study, um .... uh, which is online, talks about, um ... I think it talks
about that. I .... I don't know the number. I don't happen to know the number. The ... I
know that across the country the ... the, urn ... the figure that we keep seeing is, um....
anywhere between half and two-thirds of buyers are looking for this, in millennials and
empty -nesters. Um, I'm an example. Um, our daughter is finishing grad school, so we're
essentially empty -nesters and, um, she .... she doesn't want to live in the single-family
house that we have! And it's a big single-family house, and my wife and I look at each
other and say, `this is too big for us now.' We, I mean maybe we won't move, but we've
actually talked about it. Hey, let's go live in a duplex or a four-plex and we can own the,
we can own the four-plex and rent the other three, or we can live in a townhouse near
Main Street, you know, that kind of thing. So, ub, I have to say, you know, I'm
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experiencing that. Yeah. So millennials and empty -nesters are the two big markets for...
for the missing middle, yeah, and that's a .... that's the other thing to really keep in mind
here. The missing middle is, uh, it's like anything. Once something gets popular it gets
abused, right? The ... we see that as .... as .... as Dan originated that term, Dan Parolek, uh,
originated that term on his observation of what was missing in the palette of choices. Uh,
people are now using it to get a bad project through, because they know that missing
middle's popular, and if they say that, the City Council and Commission will go, oh,
that's cool! You're doing missing middle and then we look at it and go, whoa, that's not
missing middle, and so (laughs) we have to constantly tell people what it is, because
we ... we don't want you to, um, be shocked (laughs) when you get something that isn't.
So again, house -scale (laughs) buildings, you know, that's, yeah. Anyway .... and I say
that because I wanna distinguish it from multi -family. Multi -family isn't wrong. It's just
another thing. It's another thing.
Teague/ Great! Any other questions for Tony? Thank you!
Perez/ Yeah, thank you! Good to talk with you. Thank you.
Teague/ Yes! Any other discussion on this topic? If there is none, go right ahead!
Eastham/ Well it seems to me that while (mumbled) opportunity to do some additional thinking
and analysis about how this particular, uh, zoning approach would affect, uh, the School
District's need to provide schools for everyone who lives here. Uh, and maybe we can
continue that discussion in somewhere.... the Superintendent may wanna do it, and uh,
staff, uh, to me just needs ... we just need to continue that.
Weiner/And my question was going to be what .... what can we as a Council, or as a city do, to
sort of continue discussions so that there don't end up being any surprises, so things can
be well coordinated.
Teague/ And I would ... is there, uh, maybe a staff that can talk to just the continuous of the ... the
City and the School relationship, um, on keepin' them abreast?
Fruin/ Good afternoon, Geoff Fruin, City Manager. Uh, so Superintendent Murley and I have
frequent conversations. Uh, we meet on a monthly basis with a group of, uh, city
managers and other folks in the community. So I feel like we're, um .... we have enough,
uh, opportunities for communication. I can share with Superintendent Murley the
updates, make sure that, uh, we're fielding any questions, uh, from him and his staff, and
of course, uh, if I note any disagreements or concerns, we would bring those to ... to the
Council as I'm sure Mr. Murley would bring those to the School Board. I think those
channels are already open.
Teague/ Great! Thank you! All right! Well we really appreciate the opportunity for, uh, Opticos
to come and give the presentation to both, uh, Iowa City Community School District and
again kinda, um, update the Iowa City City Council, and we have two new Councilors, so
that was, uh, their first time, you know, on this side of the table, learnin' about this, and
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so we really appreciate all the work you're doin'. Is there any other items that we want
to ... any other comments for .... right now? If there are none, we stand adjourned. (bangs
gavel)
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council and the
ICCSD joint meeting/work session of February 19, 2020.