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03-26-09 Site Review MinutesSITE DEVELOPMENT REVIEW COMMITTEE SUMMARY Thursday, March 26, 2009 Lower Level Main Conference Room 201 First Avenue East ATTENDING: Charlie Johnson, Construction Manager Jeff Clawson, Building Official Frank Castles, Deputy Public Works Director Sean Conrad, Senior Planner Dan Diehl, Acting Fire Chief Michelle Anderson, Recording Secretary Guests: James Freyholtz, MDT. Hear the Public: No one wished to speak. Performance Bond Reminders: None. OLD BUSINESS: None. Paul Burnham, Assistant City Engineer Tom Jentz, Planning & Bldg Director Chad Fincher, Parks Superintendent Dwain Elkins, Plans Examiner P.J. Sorensen, Chairman NEW BUSINESS: Red's — Expansion — KM Building 30 2nd Street East: Sorensen said Red's is looking at doing an expansion which is mostly on the inside of the KM Building in the space where the Bull Dog was located with a deck area on the alley side of the building. Sorensen noted he told them to talk to Public Works regarding sewer impact fees. Sorensen described the project for the committee. Public Works said they will take a look at the building. Diehl noted the KM Building has not been in compliance with fire codes for quite some time and not only will this expansion space have to have sprinklers installed but the entire building will have to be brought into compliance before the Fire Department will sign off on this expansion. Diehl added he doesn't think it is in the public's best interest to continue to allow additional assembly use in a building that is out of compliance. Sorensen asked Diehl to contact Bill Goodman for the sprinkler drawings. Java Zoom — 540 W Idaho: Sorensen said they are proposing a drive -up espresso shop not a drive - through espresso shop. Sorensen reviewed the site for the committee. Public Works noted it was confusing which direction the vehicles will travel under the canopy. Diehl asked if there were still underground tanks on site and Sorensen didn't know however there hasn't been a gas station at that location for 30 years. Diehl said the tanks and associated piping will still need to be removed. Castles suggested DEQ may have documentation where that indicates that the tanks were removed. Sorensen reviewed the curb cuts to the site in which there are 3. Sorensen said he told them that the Site Review Committee may require that the 47 foot curb cut onto Idaho may have to be removed and Public Works agreed. Johnson asked to visit the site and added left-hand turns may also have to be restricted. Sorensen asked James Freyholtz from MDT take a look at the traffic flow and note what changes should be made. Fincher said Parks may ask for green space along the boulevard. Sorensen there isn't any space for a landscaped boulevard in the R/W but the city could require a 5ft wide landscaped buffer between the sidewalk and onto their property. Clawson said the traffic will come in from both directions and is there anything wrong that and Public Works said that is not the problem. However when you look at coffee shops in the morning there can be several cars lined up which could cause major problems and Sorensen added it probably would be better to have the traffic coming off of Idaho so the stack of cars would not block the parking spaces. Sorensen noted another problem is where they would store their espresso on the go van, '/z of the building would then be an industrial type of use where they would store the mobile unit and the other half would be the drive up business. Castles added there would be additional room on the east side of the building for more parking spaces and Sorensen agreed they will probably have to provide more parking spaces there but it will be determined on what the committee decides will be the best traffic flow on site. PLANNING OFFICE ITEMS: Nothing for planning board but going to council is the final plat for the 911 Center (Timberwolf Center Phase 1B). Castles said it needs to be reiterated that Timberwolf Parkway is a publically dedicated R/W that is open to anyone and cannot be controlled by DNRC. Sorensen said they are looking at constructing storage sheds on the property which will come before Site Review. Sorensen added a significant issue is that one of the sheds will be storing fuels. Diehl noted the Fire Department told DNRC yesterday that they would not be able to use a temporary building for storage of fuels and they will have to get an engineer to design the storage building since the building has to meet the same requirements of a structure. There was discussion whether all storage buildings at commercial sites need to have foundations. Clawson added a building permit is required for a 120 sf building or larger however, a 400 sf building or larger requires a foundation. Sorensen said most of the sheds were proposed at 12' x 12' and they are designing a fuel containment system. Clawson asked if stormwater had been addressed for the additional paving and Sorensen said it was one of the bid alternatives and the site review submittals will have to include stormwater calculations. In addition, Sorensen said council has approved the first reading ofthe PUD amendments that included the setback changes and the increased tower height. OTHER REPORTS: Hilton Homewood Suites: Sorensen reported the Hilton Homewood Suites is looking at coming in soon to get their permit. Sorensen had sent them a letter to address some zoning issues and he asked if any other departments had any lingering issues. No issues were brought up. 245 Windward Way: Sorensen said Architectural Review Committee was not happy with the major deviation of their approved plans, and the committee is looking at a requirement for additional landscaping. Fincher agreed that what was approved for landscaping was not installed. Jentz noted this area had an issue with underground utilities and they were unable to locate trees in the boulevard, but instead they were to be installed on the private property. Fincher said that may be right but no trees have been installed. Sorensen suggested they look at the plans. Johnson noted there are issues with their parking lot, sidewalks, and handicap ramps. Diehl said he spoke to the contractor and told him that until the sprinkler system is operational the building can't be occupied, however, shortly after that the building was occupied by an insurance agent. Sorensen noted that Sean Fitzpatrick of CTA, although he has relocated to Sandpoint, ID, is still working on this project. Johnson reported the access problems to building sites due to the spring breakup. He said not only is this a safety issue because emergency vehicles cannot access these sites but the city includes a condition with subdivisions that requires a hard surface access must be in place when combustible construction is underway and he questioned why they would receive final plat approval or a building permit if that condition isn't met. Further discussion was held regarding the requirement that the stormwater system is required to be installed prior to construction; developing an email communication system to link each department for approvals before issuing building permits; issuing a stop work order and flagging the site; and which department would have the trigger to enforce this problem. Johnson said Public Works plans to work with the Fire Department to make sure that the hard surface access and stormwater system be put in place before the building permits are issued. There was discussion regarding the Fire Department's inability to cite violators in fire safety related issues and Sorensen reviewed the process for sign violation citations. Burnham said whenever it snows the Woodland/Conrad intersection has to be sanded pretty heavily and Public Works is requesting a memo from Parks or Peccia & Associates on how the problems with that intersection will be resolved. Not only is a maintenance nightmare for the street department but it is also a safety issue. Fincher asked Burnham to send Mike Baker an email with that request and Fincher added the engineer was waiting for approval from Parks on the redesign. Burnham said he would contact Mike Baker and send a copy to the consultant. Castles asked if Public Works would have an opportunity to review the plans for the bike path extension near Sylvan Court and Fincher said he would try to get a set of plans for the trail extension for the Public Works Department. The meeting was adjourned at 11:10 a.m.