Planning Board Public Meeting Minutes 20171121

The following minutes are a summary of the Planning Board meeting of November 21, 2017. Interested parties may request an audio recording of the meeting from the Board Secretary for a fee.

Call to Order & Statement of Compliance with the Open Public Meetings Act: Mr. Joel called the meeting to order at 7:35 p.m. Following members were present: MAYOR KNUDSEN, Joel Torielli, Richard Joel, Councilman Jeff Voigt, Melanie McWilliams, David Scheibner, and Frances Barto. Also present were Christopher Martin, Esq., Board Attorney; Village Planner Kendra Lelie; Village Engineer Chris Rutishauser; and Board Secretary Michael Cafarelli. Ms. Patire was not present.

Public Comments on Topics not Pending Before the Board – No one came forward.

Committee/Commission/Professional Updates for Non Agenda Topics, Correspondence – There were none.

KS Broad Street II, Preliminary and Final Major Site Plan, 76 & 80 Chestnut Street and 25-27 Franklin Avenue, Block 2005, Lots 11,12,13,14 - Following is the transcript of the meeting, prepared by Laura A. Carucci, C.C.R., R.P.R.:

First item will be public comment on topics not pending before the board. Do we have any comments from the public? 

Yes, please approach the lectern, state your name? 

MR. UNLUSOY:  Sure. My name is Pulent Unlusoy, I am a resident   
MR. CAFARELLI:  Pardon me, can you spell your name?
MR. UNLUSOY:  Sure. First name P u l e n t. Last name U n l u s o y.
MR. CAFARELLI:  And your address please? 
MR. UNLUSOY:  102 Oak Street.
MR. CAFARELLI:  Thank you.
MR. UNLUSOY:  I'm an owner.
MR. CAFARELLI:  I'm sorry? 
MR. UNLUSOY:  I'm an owner.
MR. CAFARELLI:  Thank you very much.
MR. UNLUSOY:  Sure. So first off thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak and express some thoughts on this project that I was notified of by mail I had some paperwork, but I actually couldn't find it coming in this morning so   
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Is that on the agenda tonight or which property? 
MR. UNLUSOY:  This is not in reference to the    I think it's the KS II project, the apartment complex being built.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. That's being presented tonight. This is for public comments on topics not pending before the board so they're going to be make a presentation and there's certain opportunity you will have to speak   
MR. UNLUSOY:  Oh, okay.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:     at that point.
MR. UNLUSOY:  Sorry.  I do not realize the structure of the evening so   
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  That's fine.
MR. UNLUSOY:  So I guess I'll present some thoughts after their presentation.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Sure.  Thank you.
Anyone else?  (No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Seeing none, do we have any committee/commission or professional updates? 
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Seeing none. 
Michael, have we received any correspondence? 
MR. CAFARELLI:  No, we haven't.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay. 
Our first item will be KS Broad Street II, Preliminary and Final Major Site Plan, 76 and 80 Chestnut Street and 25 though 27 Franklin Avenue, Block 2005, Lots 11, 12, 13 and 14. The attorney on this matter is Jason Tuvel. Welcome.  
MR. TUVEL:  Good evening, Mr. Chairman, Members of the Board, Jason Tuvel. 
I'm attorney for the applicant. Just before we get started, are there any more members that you're waiting for so that they're all eligible to vote? 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: MAYOR KNUDSEN will be late. And Debbie can't make it tonight. So   
MR. TUVEL:  Okay.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: So she said she would be about an hour.
MR. TUVEL: So we should get started then. All right. So thank you for having me back. This is an application for preliminary and final major site plans, soil moving and bulk variance for Block 2005, Lots 11 through 15. As everybody on the board is well aware, the board approved an application in June of this year for a 66 unit apartment building, mixed use building, with 5,500 square feet of retail. The 66 units with residential component, including one , two  and three bedroom units as a mix. And it also included an affordable housing component. During the course of those proceedings, and I think you've heard Mr. Saraceno at the end of those proceedings mentioned that although that application was as of right, we didn't have any variance relief that was associated with it, we did hear the comments from the board, as well as the public, with respect to certain aspects of it, and that we would continue to evaluate whether or not that project could be enhanced. So that's what we've done over the last several months with your board professional, who have been very helpful, in terms of reviewing the plan and the submission that we've done. So let me discuss some of the aspects of the project that have changed. So as I mentioned before, the initial project was for 66 units comprised of one , two  and three bedroom apartments. This application reduces the amount of units to 60. So we've gone from 66 to 60 units. And the makeup of the units are 45 two bedroom units and 15 one bedroom units. So the three bedroom unit component is no longer a part of this application. In addition to that, as the board is aware, in terms of the affordable units, there will be no affordable units at this project. As your ordinance allows in a B 3 R zone, we are providing these now off site at The Enclave project, 257, that this board approved very recently. In terms of the retail space, the retail space increases slightly by approximately 2664 square feet, but the overall size of the building, the footprint of the building    not the footprint, but the square footage of the building actually is again reduced. It was initially approved at 102,585 square feet, the new project is smaller. It's 98,243 square feet. Just discussing the density a little bit, the B 3 R zone on which the property is located allows for density of 35 units per acre in the B 3 R zone. The project that the board approved in June of this year had a density of 32.8. So you're allowed 70 units based on the amount of acres that we have, 66 units were approved at 32.8. The revised project or the application that you have before you is at 29.8 units per acre. So under 30 units per acre. So we're actually ten units less than what's permitted in the zone from a density requirement. The project still conforms and the site plan is nearly identical with all setbacks, coverages, parking. The application still complies with all of your aspects of zoning with the exception of one item which is height. So the application requires one bulk variance for building height where 50 feet is permitted in the B 3 R.  We're seeking a variance to go up to 54 feet 11 inches. And the reason for that, despite the fact that the density of the project is decreasing, we were allowed to get a better floor to ceiling height in the units, which we believe makes the units more attractive to future occupants. In addition to that, even though we are seeking a height variance, what you'll see through the testimony of our architect is that at the street level on Franklin Avenue the building is actually shorter than what was previously approved by the board, and the reason for that is that the fifth story, unlike the previous project, is actually set back 15 feet from the street. And you'll see that when the architect makes his presentation. The other item that    the other two items that I wanted to note in terms of change, the architecture has substantially changed from the last application. The board, as well as the public, had some comments relating to the architecture. We worked with your planner, we had a lot of talks about that during the course of our initial proceedings, and we think that the architecture that we're presenting this evening is a significant improvement for the area. Another issue that came up throughout those initial proceedings was the location of the exterior amenity space. As you remember, we had it right next to the railroad tracks. I think although it complied with the ordinance, I think most people on the board felt it could be placed in another location that would have, you know, better functionality for the residents of the area. So as you'll see, we did change that and worked with your planning staff to make sure that that was in a better location than what was previously proposed and approved. I reviewed, with our project team and our client, the board professionals' reports, so anything that's applicable from your board engineer's report we would comply with. A lot of them are substantially similar to the previous application, so again, we have no problems with that. Your traffic engineer's letter is identical, essentially, to the initial letter, and that's really because the application is essentially the same from a traffic standpoint. If anything, we've actually reduced, again, the size of the building and the number of units that are located within it, so all of the items stated in your traffic engineer's report are stipulated to and we have no problems complying with them. Your planner's report, the landscaping requirements, there were some landscaping recommendations made in Ms. McManus's report. We are happy to comply with those as well. The other items, there were several items that just required testimony and we'll provide testimony on those items. So I have the whole project team, literally the same project team that you heard testimony before on the prior application; our site engineer, traffic engineer, architect and professional planner. I only intend on calling our architect and our professional planner. As I said before, the site plan is substantially the same. We comply with all those elements of the Zoning Ordinance as to the site, and again, we stipulate to the items mentioned in the comments in your engineer's letter. So unless there's any questions for me, I'd be happy to call Dave Nicholson, our project architect, who was previously sworn and accepted by the board as an expert. I'm happy to go through his qualifications again, if you'd like me to, to present the change in the architecture, as well as some of the other features of the project.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. I just wanted to check, does anyone have any questions on anything? So it's a new application. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  I have a question.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Yes, sure.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Perhaps it's a stupid question. 
So supposing this doesn't get approved. Just, theoretically, what happens?  Do you stay with the old one, stay with the old application? Is that how it works? 
MR. TUVEL: So that's a good question. No, it was actually a very good question because there's actually case law on this issue. So there's case law that deals with    it's actually a pretty recent case, to be honest with you, I don't know why it was never dealt with before. But, yes, you are allowed to have two approvals on a property. You're allowed to do that. But the intent of the Applicant that I can represent to you is that should this project be approved, that we think it's a better alternative to what was previously approved, even though that was in full conformance with your Zoning Ordinance, this is what would get built.
MR. MARTIN:  We can probably put something to the effect that they're vacating the prior resolution and moving forward. But we can work with that. I believe, Jason, just parenthetically, you've had two pending applications on the same property at one time.
MR. TUVEL:  Yes. I mean, the    not to get too antidotal reasoning on it, it's just to give the developers, homeowners, just more flexibility in terms of what they can do with their property. But you have my representation that should this project get approved, this is the one that we want to move forward with.  And I could work with Chris on a letter to that effect, if we get to that point and when we get to that point.
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Would the denial of this application change, in any way, the approval of the other application?
MR. TUVEL:  No. We would, that    that approval   
MS. McWILLIAMS: That's important. I was just asking.
MR. TUVEL: Yes. So they're two separate applications. If this one goes forward, we wouldn't move forward with the other one. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: MR. NICHOLSON? 
MR. TUVEL: I'd like to bring up MR. NICHOLSON. You could, I guess, swear him in again because it's a separate application.
MR. MARTIN:  MR. NICHOLSON, raise your right hand. 
Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?
MR. NICHOLSON:  I do.
D A V I D   N I C H O L S O N,    
545 West 45th Street, New York City, New York, having been duly sworn, testifies as follows:
MR. MARTIN:  And just for the record your name and business address, please.
MR. NICHOLSON: David Nicholson. I'm a principal of SBLM Architects at 545 West 45th Street in New York City.
MR. MARTIN: You've previously been qualified before this board as an architect in New Jersey and you're so qualified tonight. Go ahead, MR. TUVEL.
MR. TUVEL:  And you're still licensed from the last time?
THE WITNESS: Yes, it's still valid.
MR. TUVEL: Terrific.
DIRECT EXAMINATION
BY MR. TUVEL: 
Q. So, MR. NICHOLSON   
MR. CAFARELLI:  MR. NICHOLSON, could you use the mic, please
THE WITNESS:  Yes, sure.
MR. CAFARELLI:  Thank you.
MR. MARTIN:  Jason? 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
MR. MARTIN:  The notice has been submitted to the board and it's in the package?
MR. TUVEL:  Yes. Everything's been submitted. My affidavit of service and publication, yes.
BY MR. TUVEL:  
Q. So, MR. NICHOLSON, why don't we start by just giving an overview of the site plan. Like I said before, it's substantially similar to the prior application, but I'd like you to, just for the record, indicate where the building is located on the lot and what we did with some of the exterior aspects of the building. 
A. Certainly. What I have here on the easel is a rendered site plan prepared by Maser, the site engineer on the project. 
MR. TUVEL: So we'll mark that as A 1. (Whereupon, Rendered Site Plan prepared by Maser is received and marked as Exhibit A 1 for identification.)
MR. MARTIN: Engineering site plan?
MR. TUVEL:  Yes, colored site plan.
THE WITNESS: And as MR. TUVEL mentioned, it is virtually identical to the one approved on the previous application. The building has an identical footprint. It sits in the identical location as the previous application on the corner of Franklin and Chestnut. The site's access points are identical and the parking layout is identical with 150 spaces (indicating).
BY MR. TUVEL: 
Q. Okay.  So, MR. NICHOLSON, the on site circulation and the access point, the location of the building, and the parking arrangements are identical to the prior application, but also conform with the ordinance requirements?
A. That's correct.
Q. And the setbacks of the building also comply with the ordinance requirements?
A. That's correct. There is no setback requirement on Franklin. There is a setback requirement on Chestnut, which we complied with in both applications.
Q. And we're proposing 150 parking spaces which is compliant with the ordinance. 
As indicated in Ms. McManus' letter, just wanted clarification as to the retail, there are 31 spaces plus two handicapped; is that correct?
A. That's correct.
Q. Okay. In terms of impervious coverage, this application conforms with the impervious coverage requirements of the ordinance?
A. It does. 
It is slightly less impervious than the previous application.
Q. All right. And could you just explain why that is, because it also ties into what I explained before about the exterior amenity space being changed since the prior application.
A. That's correct, MR. TUVEL. The    we had proposed an exterior amenity space for the residents of the building as required by your ordinance in the southwest corner of the site, adjacent to the railroad trestle. And as you may recall, some members of the board felt that that was a location that had all sorts of issues, and so we have moved that exterior amenity to an outside terrace on the fifth floor of the building.  And I'll describe that a little bit more thoroughly later. So this   
Q. So that's as of right now   
A. This area is now going to have some landscaping and it is now pervious.
Q. Okay. And the other exterior amenity space, I know you're going to talk about that when you talk about the building, is located along Chestnut Street; is that correct?
A. That is correct. And that has not changed from the prior application. It has been, as we went through the prior application, changed, improved, based on comments we received from the board and from the board's planner, and it remains as previously approved.
Q. Okay. 
So all of the plans    all of the suggestions and comments from the prior application have also been integrated into this site plan; is that correct?
A. That's correct.
Q. All right. Let's go to the architectural features of the application because I think those are the most significant changes that were made. 
A. I am going to put up two exterior renderings. The one on my left is the one we are proposing tonight.  The one on my right is the one presented to you at the last hearing for the previous application (indicating). 
Q. All right. So let's mark the new one as A 2 and the old one for the prior application as A 3. 
THE WITNESS:  The new one A 2?
MR. TUVEL:  Yes, and the prior one A 3.
(Whereupon, New Exterior Rendering is received and marked as Exhibit A 2 for identification.)(Whereupon, Old Exterior Rendering is received and marked as Exhibit A 3 for identification.)
BY MR. TUVEL: 
Q. Why don't you describe the differences between the prior application and the current application?
A. Several things are the same. The palette of materials is relatively the same. And I say "relatively" because several times the board members and the planner had previously indicated there were too many different kinds of material. So we have, using the same palette, reduced the number of materials. We've eliminated the Hardie plank. And we've eliminated the alternate roof material so it is now all synthetic slate roofing. And we have changed the corner element. And I'm sure that's the most prominent thing that you see when comparing these two elevations (indicating). But there are other significant changes, and those relate to both the size of the building; as you mentioned, this building is over 4,000 square feet smaller, and the fifth floor has been pulled back from Franklin with a 15 foot setback. So you'll notice that on the older design you see five floors along Franklin (indicating). 
On this design you see four, not five, because the fifth floor is set back and not visible in this view (indicating). In changing the design we also paid attention to a comment that was made by your planner that the building, in each of its segments, should have a bottom, middle and a top. The older design actually had more material variation in the vertical, and we've eliminated that (indicating). But as I mentioned before, most importantly, the corner element has been modified. It's a lot cleaner. It's a lot more classic in its design. 
Q. Okay. And you indicated that along Franklin, the fifth story is set back so is it, in fact, a four story on Franklin compared to the prior application? It's actually shorter, so what you see   
A. That's correct.  Even though we had increased the floor to floor heights of each of the floors for the reason you mentioned, this eave, this parapet wall here (indicating) at the top of the fourth floor, the effective height on Franklin is 3 foot 8 inches shorter than the eave line on the previous design. 
Q. Okay. Can you describe about where the exterior amenity space is located within the building? 
A. The exterior amenity space is on the fifth floor, and I have a fifth floor plan that was included in the board package. Beg your pardon. It's over here. It's an area of almost comparable size to the one by the railroad trestle.
Q. Just    I'm sorry, just refer to that, that was a sheet that was in the board's packet?
A. This is a fifth floor plan dated November 20th. 
THE WITNESS:  We'll make it exhibit? 
MR. TUVEL:  A 4.
THE WITNESS:  A 4. (Whereupon, Fifth Floor Plan dated November 20, 2017 is received and marked as Exhibit A 4 for identification.)  
THE WITNESS: You'll recognize the L shape, the L shape    the L shape of the building. Franklin Avenue is along the bottom, Chestnut Street is on the right hand side. And you can see that the fifth floor is set back from the Franklin Street property line by about 15 feet. This    these from the western corner to this point here, almost to Chestnut, those are private terraces for the fifth floor apartments (indicating). 
The    this larger terrace located adjacent to the corner element is for all residents (indicating). It's accessed from the door, via door from the public hall, immediately adjacent to the hall.
BY MR. TUVEL:
Q. And there was comment in the planner's letter regarding how that exterior amenity space would be used. It's my understanding in speaking with the Applicant that the individual unit owners, in terms of their apartments, would be able to use that exterior space as they so saw fit? In addition, as to the common floor areas by, you know, the management company would be able to utilize that as they see fit, whether it be tables, chairs, things of that nature, for the occupants of the premises to enjoy. 
A. That's correct.
Q. Okay. Let's talk about the roof a little bit. Do you have a roof plan there?
A. I do.
MR. TUVEL: Let's mark that. I think we're up to A 5. A 5 is the roof plan. A 4 was, if I didn't say it before, the fifth floor plan. (Whereupon, Roof Plan is received and marked as an Exhibit A 5 for identification.)
BY MR. TUVEL:
Q. So just for clarification, I don't want to spend a lot of time on the roof plan, but just to point out something that was mentioned in the planner's letter, all of the mechanical equipment or rooftop appurtenances now comply with the height limitations of the ordinance; is that correct?
A. That's correct. 
There is nothing on the roof that is taller than 58 feet above average grade.
Q. Okay.  And then in terms of rooftop coverage   
A. In addition to that, none of those elements that are above the base elevation exceed either 20 percent of the roof area or 20 percent of the length of the facade upon which they bear.
Q. So it's your professional opinion that those two items have now been complied with or you would stipulate that they would comply?
A. That's correct.
Q. All right. The makeup of the units, just, could you just briefly, is the floor plan the same? If you could just reiterate what I had mentioned about the make up of the units in the building? 
A. Right. 
Of the 60 units, 45 are two bedrooms and 15 are one bedroom units.
Q. Okay. And in terms of the materials of the building, I believe there was some question regarding that, I think you might have went into some detail. Is there anything else you want to add?
A. I prepared modified elevations for conditions of the planner where we have identified all the materials. For tonight, I could tell the board members as before the base is manufactured stone. The principal materials for the elevations are brick and EIFS. And the roofing material that you see on the mansard roofs is synthetic slate.
Q. In speaking with the planner's letter, the planning recommendations, we would comply with those? 
A. Yes.
Q. All right. And then there were some architectural comments that Ms. McManus had in her letter, we can just go through those very briefly. Dave, would you be willing to submit a detail of the mansard roof; is that acceptable?
A. Yes. There was a comment    there was a comment relative to the details of how windows fit in with the mansard, we would certainly provide it. There was comments about signage. We had submitted, in September, after initial comments, a diagram concerning signage, which I'll just put up here (indicating). The design    the elevation of the building has provided for a sign band, and the intention is to require all commercial tenants to put their signage on that sign band, so this is a board entitled "Building Signage".
MR. TUVEL: So we'll mark that as A 6. 
(Whereupon, "Building Signage" board is received and marked as Exhibit A 6 for identification.)
THE WITNESS: And it has been drawn to comply with current Village ordinances concerning signage. It limits the signage to the sign band and to a size required by ordinance. We're proposing reverse lit channel letters posted off the building no more than the Village's ordinance requires. And so that's what we would intend for signage on this building. 
Of course, the tenants would apply separately for their own signage.
BY MR. TUVEL:
Q. So the signs would all conform to the ordinance. 
Can you just briefly talk about the lighting? There was also something that was mentioned in the planner's letter, the exterior amenity lighting. 
A. Yes.  As    as on the previous application, there are wall sconces along the length of the building to provide illumination of the sidewalk, in conjunction with the public lighting that is there.
Q. I think the last comment was about canopies above the retail space?
A. We're a little leery about canopies above that retail space, and I will explain the    in the sign exhibit would be the appropriate drawing, because the sidewalk slopes from a low point at the intersection of Franklin and Chestnut, to a high point about three quarters of the way down the facade, before the sidewalk starts and this ends (indicating) to the underpass, both underneath the railroad trestle, the distance between the sidewalks and the sign then becomes very short. And we would be concerned about retractable awnings, which is what the ordinance requires, being too low at that point. And we would want to see a uniform solution across the entire facade. So we're reluctant to incorporate those canopies into the design.
Q. So besides the canopy issue, everything else in the board planner's letter was acceptable?
A. That's correct.
MR. TUVEL:  I have nothing further for MR. NICHOLSON. I welcome the board's questions or   
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Jeff, any questions for MR. NICHOLSON?
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Yes. Who's going to talk about parking? Can we address parking here, the requirement for the members of the residential units or number of parking spaces. 
MR. TUVEL:  It complies with the ordinance.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Yes. No, I understand. 
But I guess my question is, so there's 33 spaces that are required based on the ordinance. 
THE WITNESS:  Correct. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: So 31 are going to be used for non residential, the other two are going to be for handicapped. Will those handicapped count towards that 33? 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Is that how the law works? I'm not clear on that. 
Chris, do you know? 
MR. MARTIN: What's that? 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Is that the number of units that are required for non residential parking spaces? It's supposed to be 33, 31 are for non residential and you're going to use two for handicapped, do they count towards the 33 total, or is it 31? 
MR. MARTIN: I'll defer to our traffic engineer on that, Jeff. 
I am aware that the planner also has the same amount of spaces, so we have the traffic engineer.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Okay.
MR. FERANDA: There are 31 parking spaces designated for retail. They allow 33 spaces for the retail, two of which are within the five handicapped parking spaces that are there. You wouldn't necessarily want to designate two of those for retail handicapped, you would want them shared, and they would be for resident and retail. The total number of parking spaces, 150 parking spaces on site, requires a total of five handicapped parking spaces. They provide that. Within those five handicapped parking spaces, because you have retail and because you have residential, there is a number required for residential, but three is the number required for retail, the two, which make up the five, five spaces are located centrally to the doorway for both the residential and retail. And my recommendation is that it not be designated retail handicapped parking, and that all the spaces be shared among the residents as well as retail.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  So, again, my question is does it comply with the ordinance of 33? It sounds like it doesn't.
MR. TUVEL: No, it does comply with the ordinance. You don't have    whenever you do a parking ordinance you don't say, well, X amount of spaces plus a handicapped. So if you require the ten based on square footage then you don't add on more. So the handicapped is inclusive within the parking requirement, so just as in the other application, it complies with the ordinance. In fact, we don't even    we weren't even required to designate the spaces as retail, that was actually a suggestion that the board had and the board's traffic engineer and planner had, in terms of how it works. 
So what I was going to do, COUNCILMAN VOIGT, is that the parking requirements complies completely with the ordinance, and we actually went above and beyond by designating the retail spaces based on the recommendation of the board previously, so we maintain that. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: I just wanted to be sure.
MR. TUVEL:  No problem.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  I wasn't clear on that.
So you talked about the height, and I'm reading the planner's report, there's a power structure and there's some bulkhead structures, and those exceed the 58 feet that the ordinance signifies as maximum. So did you    were you going to talk about that in the in the (c) and (d) variances? 
MR. TUVEL: So I'm sorry if I wasn't being clear, but when I asked MR. NICHOLSON if the rooftop equipment complied with the ordinance, the answer was yes. And based on the comments that were received from your planner, and I have spoken to Chris about this, in order to be conservative, we felt as though they were accessory structures and actually weren't subject to that 58 foot limitation. However, we went back and forth on this several times. In order to be conservative, MR. NICHOLSON has reduced those below the 58 feet, so that issue has been eliminated.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Okay. I just wanted to make sure. All right.
MR. TUVEL: And we're taking the conservative approach on that. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Okay. That's it. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Dave? 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  No, that    that answered one of my principal questions. So that the    what we used to call the tower structure really now we're calling it a corner feature, right? 
THE WITNESS:  It is    it is no taller than anything else that is at the very top of the building. 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  And it still has a hip roof? 
THE WITNESS:  I'm sorry?
MR. SCHEIBNER:  It has the hip roof? 
THE WITNESS:  No, it does not have a hipped roof. 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  Oh, it doesn't.
THE WITNESS:  The limitation that was brought to our attention by the planner's report basically eliminated the possibility of having a hipped roof that    that had any meaning. I mean, we could have put in a very, very shallow hip roof and nobody would ever have seen it   
MR. SCHEIBNER:  Yes.
THE WITNESS:    in probability.
MR. SCHEIBNER: Which brings me to the next question I had, do you have a diagram that shows the sight lines from the street? Like from across the street? 
THE WITNESS: No, I do not. I can tell you that we constructed this model very, very carefully. You are standing as if you just came out of the day spa and looking this way (indicating), and it is true that if you walked to the corner of Franklin and Broad and you walked a little bit up the road you would see parts of the fifth floor. If you crossed the street here (indicating), you would not. If you walked down here opposite the building, you would not (indicating). But there will be vantages from the surrounding streets where you will see the fifth floor. I don't want to represent anything else.
MR. SCHEIBNER: No, I found that there was a    that sort of diagram was part of the presentation of The Enclave and I found it very helpful. And I just wanted to know if you had that. But, I think that's it.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: CHIEF ? 
CHIEF Van Goor: The only question I have is to get to the roof are the stairs going to extend all the way up to the roof. 
THE WITNESS:  The access from the fifth floor stair landing to the roof will be through a ship's ladder and on that BILCO.
MR. TUVEL: And just to go over that, the roof will only be accessible for maintenance people, correct? 
THE WITNESS: That's correct. The HVAC maintenance. The elevator will be maintained from the fifth floor. 
CHIEF Van Goor:  All right. Well, I'm just thinking of the fire department, if there's a problem on the roof, how would you get up there? 
THE WITNESS:  It will be    it will be accessible, but for the fire department and for HVAC maintenance personnel.
MS. McWILLIAMS:  How again? 
THE WITNESS:  Through a    through a roof    through a ship's ladder, which is basically a steep stair, and a roof hatch, BILCO   
MR. TUVEL:  The applicant   
THE WITNESS:    is a manufacturer.
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Yes.
MR. TUVEL:  The application has to comply with all fire codes, there's no ifs, ands or buts about that. 
CHIEF Van Goor:  Right now looking at the plan it looks like the stairs went all the way up to the roof in the plans.  That's why I was wondering.
THE WITNESS:  In the    in the plan that you    that was submitted, that is correct. But this is one of the changes that we made in response to the planner's letter. So this roof plan would be a substitution of the roof plan you would have in your application packet where we would change that roof access to the BILCO hatch. 
CHIEF Van Goor: Okay. So we don't have that plan? 
THE WITNESS: You do not, sir.
CHIEF Van Goor: All right.
MR. MARTIN: This was a big issue in terms of height that I've got to give Beth credit, she was tenacious on that roof and just trying to make sure that the height was appropriate. But you are the CHIEF  and that's an excellent question. I mean, is there something that is a concern now that there's not stairs to the roof, even though it has complied with the fire safety code? 
CHIEF Van Goor:  I'll have to look into it more. I don't know    off the top of my head without seeing the plan with how when you come out of the stairs and you go right up? 
THE WITNESS: The access to    to the roof for the fire department will be only slightly different than how it was in our original submission or in the previous application in that it will still be a stair to the roof, but it won't be a bulkhead, it will be a hatch. 
CHIEF Van Goor: So the original one had a ship's ladder also? 
THE WITNESS: Our original application, during that process the stair bulkhead was not treated as an appurtenance that needed to comply with the 8 foot height restriction. However, because our roof was at 50 feet and our limitation was at 58, I had room for bulkhead, 8 feet you can just hit it because the headroom up the stair has to be 7 feet that gives you 12 inches for the roof, it works. With a height variance of 54 foot 11, now the difference between the absolute height limit of 5 foot 8 and 54, actually my roof is a little bit lower than that, I don't have room for the bulkhead.
MR. TUVEL:  Right.
But to the CHIEF 's point, the point is that there's still steps that lead to the roof? 
THE WITNESS:  Absolutely. 
MR. TUVEL:  I think that was more the question.
THE WITNESS:  Yes.  There will be access to the roof for the fire department.
CHIEF Van Goor:  Because of the setback we won't really use a ladder to get up to the roof from the front of the building, so we will need access. 
THE WITNESS:  Actually if    if the fire department was more comfortable with a ladder from one of the fifth floor terraces, we could accommodate the department that way. 
CHIEF Van Goor:  From one of the fifth floor   
THE WITNESS:  From the fifth floor terrace.
CHIEF Van Goor: Oh.
THE WITNESS: I'd have to go back to my fifth floor plan. So this is the fifth floor plan, there's our public terrace. 
CHIEF Van Goor: Right.
THE WITNESS:  A ladder against this wall (indicating), properly protected so only the department could use it, could also be another way to get to the roof.
CHIEF Van Goor:  Oh, I was thinking if it's closer to the stairs then it would be closer to the standpipe where we connect our hose to. So that's    if it was inside close to the stairwell it would be better.  If that's where you're planning to put it? 
THE WITNESS: I'm sure when we get into the building plan development we'll be meeting with the department to make sure we comply with all the requirements.
MR. TUVEL: That was actually one of the comments in Chris's report as well that we have to do that.
CHIEF Van Goor: Okay.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: And we have had resolutions where it says it has to comply with all fire department recommendations.
CHIEF Van Goor:  Right. Okay.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Yes.  Melanie? 
MS. McWILLIAMS:
VOICE:  I think for the moment, I don't.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Joel? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: Just one. 
How did you land at 54 feet? You used 54'11 as the height? 
THE WITNESS:  Correct. 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: How'd you measure that height.
THE WITNESS: The    it was a balance of two factors; one was the desire to provide more ceiling height in the units. The other was for a technical reason about how we build the floors, whether we build the floors very, very thin using very, very heavy members or we use lighter members more widely spaced and have the ability to provide more superior acoustical treatment. Obviously in a rental building it's very, very important that you don't hear your neighbors either aside, above or below you. And being able to construct the floors a particular way that needed more height, gave us a much superior product. 
So it's a combination of those two factors.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: Maybe it's a question for the planner, but the    looks like you're just under 10 percent.
THE WITNESS: Correct. 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  So there's a (c) variance for the height. 
MR. TUVEL: That's correct.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  So another inch you'd be a (d) variance? 
MR. TUVEL: That's correct.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: So that probably factored in, too, right? 
MR. TUVEL:  Well, we wouldn't want to go higher. That's correct.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  I think that's probably why you hit that number. 
THE WITNESS: Yes. 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: Okay. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Any other questions? 
Did the unit, itself, pick up any increased height within it? 
THE WITNESS: Yes.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: How much height does it pick up? 
THE WITNESS:  I'm trying to remember off the top of my head. I'm sorry. I have    I don't have that information with me.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Is it a sizable increase? What was it before, do you remember? 
THE WITNESS:  It was    it was just under 9 feet and now it's just over, well over 9 feet. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  I have no further questions. 
Kendra, do you have any questions?
MS. LELIE:  Just a quick question.
MR. MARTIN: Well, Kendra, you might spill over into actually saying something more than just a question. So raise your right hand.
Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, so help you God? 
MS. LELIE:  I do.
K E N D R A   L E L I E, Having been duly sworn, testifies as follows: 
MR. MARTIN: And so stipulate to Kendra's qualifications   
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
MR. MARTIN:    as a professional planner? 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
MR. MARTIN: Thank you. 
MS. LELIE: Just a question on the lighting. I didn't see any details of that. Do we have details of the wall sconces? 
THE WITNESS: There was, in the original application, and I apologize they weren't replicated. We can certainly provide those.
MS. LELIE: All right. That would just be an additional item.
THE WITNESS: Correct. 
MS. LELIE: And then the signage, so in the September submission you indicated that was part of this application. 
THE WITNESS:  Yes. 
MS. LELIE:  Okay.  That's all the questions I have. Thank you. No other questions.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay.  Chris, do you have any questions? 
MR. RUTISHAUSER:  Not at this time.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Andrew, do you have any questions? 
MR. FERANDA:  I just have one comment, but it's a minor comment.
MR. MARTIN:  We might as well get    do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, so help you God?
MR. FERANDA:  I do.
A. ANDREW FERANDA, PE, PTOE, C.M.E., Having been duly sworn, testifies as follows: 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  And do you stipulate to qualify   
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
MR. MARTIN:     as a professional traffic expert? 
Thank you. 
MR. FERANDA:  Within the parking comment that I had, No. 5, I recommend that signs be installed on the buildings stating that the parking in the parking lot are for residents and retail use    well, on site retail use, is that something that   
MR. TUVEL: Yes. That was fine. Then we indicated in the beginning that we were okay with your comments. 
MR. FERANDA: Okay.
MR. TUVEL: That was included in it, but just to be clear, yes.
MR. FERANDA:  Thank you.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. Next will be questions from the public. If anyone from the public wants to ask questions of MR. NICHOLSON, just come forward and just state your name and address. 
MR. UNLUSOY: Pulent Unlusoy, 102 Oak Street, Ridgewood.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Please go to the lectern. 
MR. UNLUSOY: Sure. Just a quick question. You guys had an approval on your first design and you want to change 66 units down to 60 units, 6,000 square feet retail, up to 8,000 square feet retail. Was the height the only reason that drove this change? What drove this change to now go back and get another approval? Why did you guys change it? 
THE WITNESS: Well, there were multiple factors. Jason, you want to tackle that one?
MR. TUVEL: Well, the answer was, I mean, it wasn't really an architectural question.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Yes and no. What drove the change, I mean there might be architectural explanations? 
MR. TUVEL: I mean, I think I went over that in the beginning of the presentation, which was we received comments from the board regarding several aspects of the application. The initial application that was approved was fully conforming. Despite that, the board did have some comments as to how the application could have been improved. We reflected upon that and we think we improved the architecture. We also think that we improved the exterior amenity space, and we think that we made the building a lot nicer. That was the goal here. We got the floor to ceiling space that we think gives a more attractive use to some of the occupants here. So we think that there are a lot of positives that come out of the application. Another thing that came out of the application is that the building is smaller and the density has been reduced. So we think that it's a win/win both for the applicant in terms of how the building appears and functions, and we think it's also a win/win for the town, for the board, and the Village in the sense that we accommodated some of the comments that were made during the initial proceedings.
MS. McWILLIAMS: I think what he's asking, and part of    I've actually be interested in the answer as well, was there a specific reason for increasing the retail space at this location? Do you have a specific    is there a tenant in mind?
MR. TUVEL: No. There's no tenant at this time. It's nonresidential space, same as we discussed at the first meeting. We would comply with the ordinance with respect to use, with respect to parking as it does now. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: You can keep asking questions if you have more. 
MR. UNLUSOY: That's all I have. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Anyone else have questions of MR. NICHOLSON? (No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL: You can move on to your next witness.
MR. TUVEL:  Okay. So the next witness I'd like to call    can you hear me on this mic? 
MR. CAFARELLI:  No, it's dead.
MR. TUVEL:  Are you still picking it up? The next witness I'd like to call is John Szabo, our professional planner. Mr. Szabo was also previously sworn and accepted as an expert and professional planner. If you'd like me to go through his qualifications again, I'm happy to do it.  
MR. MARTIN: That's fine. 
Mr. Szabo, raise your right hand. Swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, so help you God?
MR. SZABO: I do.
J O H N   P.  S Z A B O, J R. 25 Westwood Avenue, Westwood, New Jersey, having been duly sworn, testifies as follows:
MR. MARTIN:  Just for the record, your name and your business address? 
MR. SZABO:  John, middle initial P, Szabo, Junior.  I work with Burgis Associates as a senior associate there, 25 Westwood Avenue, Westwood, New Jersey.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  And so qualified as a professional planner tonight.
MR. TUVEL:  Thank you. I figured out you just have to press the button and then it goes on. 
DIRECT EXAMINATION
BY MR. TUVEL:
Q. So, Mr. Szabo, in connection with this application you reviewed all the application materials, plans and reports that were submitted?
A. I have.
Q. All right. And you've also reviewed the Master Plan and Zoning Ordinance for the Village of Ridgewood?
A. I'm familiar, yes.
Q. And you visited the site and the surrounding area?
A. Yes, I have.
Q. All right.  Can you    we have one variance that is associated with this application, which is a bulk variance for the height. 
Can you give your professional opinion on this variance, starting with the positive criteria?
A. Yes. 
As a result of amendments and alterations to the original building design, there is now a height variance to exceed the 50 foot maximum permitted in a B 3 R zone. Now this has to be treated in response to the inquiry that an made earlier, it should be treated as a (c) variance bulk as opposed to a (d) because we are not exceeding the maximum height from the required 50 foot maximum, by more than 10 feet or 10 percent. So when we talk about relief, this request for the variance is recognized under what we would call the (c)(2) benefit standard of the Municipal Land Use Law which states that where an application or appeal relating to a specific piece of property, the purpose of this act would be advanced by a deviation from the Zoning Ordinance requirement and the benefit of the deviation would substantially outweighing any detriments that the board may grant the requested relief. We have to really tie this into the purposes of the Municipal Land Use Law under 40:55D N.J.S.A. Section II. So when we go through our analysis and we look at the criteria and we look at the purposes of the act, we see that we satisfy five purposes that are enumerated in the statute. The application advances the purposes of the Municipal Land Use Law in a number of broad ways. It's a proposed development that's permitted in the zone. It's in substantial compliance with the Village Zoning Ordinance. And, most importantly in my opinion, the application implements the recommendation of the Village's most recent Master Plan document the 2006 re examination report, the 2015 Master Plan/Land Use Amendment, and 2016 Master Plan Re Examination. So with only those three factors greatly contribute to the fact we are advancing the purposes of the Municipal Land Use Law. But there is specific purposes that I'd like to focus on. There are five, as I've mentioned. I'm going to group a few of them together because they're related. 40:55D 2(a), to encourage municipal action to guide an appropriate use or development of all land in the state in a manner which would promote the public health, safety, morals and general welfare.  Purpose E, to promote through the establishment of appropriate population densities and concentrations that will contribute to the well being of person's neighborhoods, community, and region and preservation of the environment. And G, to provide sufficient space and appropriate locations for a variety of agricultural, residential, recreational, commercial, industrial uses in open space in order to meet the needs of all New Jersey residents. Those three kind of grouped together, and the reason we are advancing the purposes of those is the fact that we are, in fact, proposing a conforming development with the exception of building height. We are implementing the Master Plan document that is really seeking to diversify the housing stock, particularly in the downtown area, to take advantage of the nexus to the rail station and the availability of transit options. It talks about the need to provide affordable housing, which this development contributes to.  For all those reasons, we are advancing these purposes. In terms of densities,[it's noted that we are actually reducing the density on site in conformance with your code as a result of this redevelopment of the building design. So there is    the purposes of promoting the appropriate use of land is being advanced significantly by this application. 
Then there are two other purposes that I'll just group together more related to the design, and that would be purpose C, to encourage adequate light, air and open space; and purpose I, to promote a desirable visual environment, through creative development techniques and good civic arrangement. 
Now, you've heard the architect describe in detail the redesign of the building and why that was done.  And what this results in is a significant improvement in the overall architectural design of the building as you can see.  We are providing this terraced effect on Franklin Avenue which reduces the visual mass that you notice from the street, so that in the overall scheme of Franklin Avenue and pedestrian streetscape that occurs there, you're not overwhelmed by the building. The terracing minimizes the height discrepancy that we are asking for.
BY MR. TUVEL:
Q. So at the street line    just to that point, so at the street line the building along Franklin Avenue, is actually shorter than what was previously approved? 
A. That's correct.
Q. All right. 
A. So in terms of that, the redesign of the site and the building resulting in a decrease in impervious coverage, which is a benefit to this area, and there's greater improved amenity space that's being provided for the residents, which I think is a positive design related to the design, creating a design for their use. In terms of light and air, the increase in the ceiling heights makes the units themselves far more airy and not as claustrophobic for the residents, but I think that contributes to the benefit of the project in terms of the people who are going to live there. So for all those reasons I think that, as testified by the architect, these purposes are being well advanced by the redesign of the building.
Q. So you think having those open terraces along Franklin Avenue, as opposed to having what was in the previous design, which is five stories straight across Franklin Avenue, furthers that point about promoting light, air and open space?
A. Yes. And I also think that based on the prior testimony that was presented when we were looking at what the area architecture looked like, this blends in far better along Franklin Avenue than what was proposed originally. 
And a lot of this was done, I would remind the board and public, in response to concerns and questions that were raised as part of the prior approval, and they're being incorporated into the redesign of the building, into a better, far better design than what was originally approved. 
Q. Having the setback of the units on the fifth floor along Franklin Avenue, does that also contribute to purpose I, the visual arrangement, in the sense that the building will not be as intrusive, even if it could comply with the ordinance?
A. That is correct. The redesign of the building aesthetically blends in better than what was planned on Franklin Avenue as a result of these architectural elements.
Q. Okay.  So in terms of the positive criteria, you've hit purpose A, purpose C and purpose I. Were there any other    purpose G you mentioned as well, right? 
A. And    yes. And I talked about E, G, and then I guess I also talked about I. There were five purposes of the Municipal Land Use law that were advanced as a result in the redesign of this building.
Q. All right.  In terms of the negative criteria, let's first take substantial impairment to the zone plan or Zoning Ordinance.
A. Well   
Q. Do you see any substantial impairment?
A. Well, as the board knows, no variance can be granted without demonstrating that the relief be granted without substantial detriment to the public good and will not substantially impair the intent and purpose of the zone plan and Zoning Ordinance. That's one of the negative criteria. And I looked at this application and I conclude that there's absolutely virtually no impact over what was approved, and we actually ended up as a substantial benefit over the original design as a result of the changes that have been incorporated into the architecture of the building. The variance relief, in my opinion, is de minimus and results in a better architectural design. The height difference of 4.9 feet is not going to be noticeable to the public in any significant way. And, in fact, the terraces along Franklin Avenue greatly minimize that impact as a result of the redesign. So I think that addresses that issue. In terms of the parking, nothing has changed and the adequacy of the traffic and everything else has been provided to the board in both the engineering report that has been supplied by the applicant's traffic engineer, as well as the village traffic engineer. So I would also point out that this project results in a reduction in density.  Again, it's visually more attractive and functional. It implements the purposes of your own Master Plan and    as well as the land use law. And it really implements the vision that the Village has for its downtown area. So I think that in exchange for that modification in height, that the benefits of everything that I just described substantially outweigh any of the detriments associated with the 4.9 percent    4.9 foot increase in height.
BY MR. TUVEL:
Q. So just a couple of things I just want to focus on. Typical issues associated with raising the height of a building would be: One, if you want to raise the height of the building beyond the ordinance requirement, it's typically because you might want more density or more units. Is that right? 
A. That is usually the case.
Q. But in this situation it's actually the opposite. We're increasing the height of the building for better functionality, while at the same time reducing the density on site. 
Is that correct?
A. That is correct. It's actually sacrificing units to get a better interior design and functional design for the site.
Q. Okay. So, in theory, all of the issues that are typically associated with height, you know, additional parking that may be required, additional density, additional trip generations, that's not occurring here because of the fact that we're not adding density to the project. This is purely a functionality and architectural benefit for this project. 
Is that right?
A. This is clearly being driven by design issues and the desire to improve the project not, for the desire to improve the intensity. In fact, this is not as an intense development as compared to what could be provided there according to the ordinance.
Q. So in your professional opinion, the granting of this one variance that we're asking in connection with this application, the benefits of that variance substantially outweigh any detriments and, in fact, you didn't see any detriment, you only saw positives?
A. I only saw benefits associated with these changes as opposed to the variance that is being requested.
Q. Great.  
MR. TUVEL: Thank you very much.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Jeff, do you have any questions? 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: How much taller is this building than the surrounding buildings? How much taller is this building versus the surrounding buildings in the area? 
THE WITNESS: That exhibit was presented at the prior hearing on this application. I don't have that exhibit with me.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Okay. Can you find that out? It sounds like it's going to be the tallest building in the area.  Yes? 
MR. TUVEL: I would have to ask the architect that question. The architect presented that at the last meeting. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: That's one concern I would have, just from a aesthetic standpoint, it becomes a very large mass. 
MR. TUVEL:  I would say that at the street line, again, Mr. Voigt, in comparison to the prior application that was approved of the street line, it's actually a shorter building than was previously approved.
THE WITNESS:  I don't think you're going to see the massing as an impact that is going to effect that area in any way whatsoever.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Why do you say that? 
THE WITNESS: Because 4 feet, with the terraces particularly on Franklin Avenue and the reduction in the building and the way this is being designed and the architectural features that are being incorporated into that building blend in a manner that I think is going to enhance the character. I don't see any impact at all. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: All right. 
THE WITNESS:  Not over 4 feet, given all those benefits. 
MS. McWILLIAMS: 4 feet from the other building, not from what people are used to seeing now.
THE WITNESS: Well, but that's what was contemplated by the ordinance. 
MS. McWILLIAMS: But to say there's not going to see a difference, it's, like, I don't know what    in what world? There is no light at all on the Chestnut side. You reference the Franklin side having the setback there will be more light. It is, you're right, there's a difference. 
On the Chestnut side there is a huge, huge shadow. There's no sunlight. There's nothing. There's nothing there now. The buildings there now are set back in its    you're in a shadow, a cold shadow at any time of the day in that area and that is just    there's no light. There's no air. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Well, so Jason, to David's point   
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Sorry.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:     point earlier, is there any way you can show us a sight line from the other side? I mean can we get that? I'm wondering if we can do that at another meeting and at the next meeting we have, could you put some sight lines so we can actually see what it looks like when you're looking at the other side of Franklin Avenue, the south side?  
MR. TUVEL:  I'll answer the question, Mr. Voigt, before we leave tonight we will answer that.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Okay. Good. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Dave? 
MR. SCHEIBNER: I'm looking at the south elevation in the plans, A 201. 
It gives the vertical dimensions of, you know, the floor level to floor level. It doesn't give me a dimension of the parapet over the average ground elevation. 
MR. TUVEL:  What's your question, regarding the building height? 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  Well, how does the proposed parapet on the south side of the building compare with the top of the previous plan? 
MR. TUVEL:  I think that's more of a question for the architect. Can I bring the architect back up to answer that question, if that's okay? 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  Sure. 
MR. NICHOLSON:  I think I've answered the question, but I'll answer it again.
If you compare    you want me to get the old elevation back. If you compare the top of that roof to the top of that parapet wall (indicating), there's a 3 foot    this one is 3 foot 8 inches lower. And the reason    and you might think it should be bigger. The reason it's not bigger is because this has no parapet wall (indicating) our roof protection was a rail that was 6.5 feet back from the edge, just a protection rail. But this, of course (indicating), to protect the terraces of the fifth floor apartments, does have a 3 foot 8 inch    3 foot 6 inch parapet wall.  
MR. SCHEIBNER: Well, and the reason that I ask that question is because visually from a person on the street, that's the real difference between these buildings on the south elevation is that parapet versus where the top of the other original building was. 
MR. NICHOLSON: It's 3 feet 8.
MR. SCHEIBNER: I have no further questions.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: James? 
CHIEF  Van Goor: I wasn't here for the original, how much shorter is this building or how much taller is this building, compared to the original? 
MR. TUVEL:  So I guess that's a    I'll try to answer, just because we're going back again on this, but the deviation    I think what we've been trying to explain is that the overall deviation of the way building height is measured in the Village is 4 feet 11 inches. That's from a building height standpoint. 
However, I think the point that's been going back and forth that's been trying to be conveyed on the Franklin Avenue elevation is that because of the fifth story being set back, the floor to ceiling height makes the building taller than that 4 feet 11 inches, and on that side of the building, compared to the previous approval, that was an as of right application, it's actually 3 foot 8 inches shorter on the Franklin Avenue side at the street line. Does that answer your question? I know there's a lot of numbers.
CHIEF Van Goor:  I think so.
MR. TUVEL:  From an overall perspective, in terms of variance relief, it's 4 feet 11 inches. 
CHIEF Van Goor:  Okay.  So it's 4 feet higher than the original   
MR. TUVEL:  Correct.  The original complied at 50 feet.
CHIEF Van Goor:  Oh, 50 feet high.
MR. TUVEL:  That's correct.
CHIEF  Van Goor:  That's all.
MR. MARTIN: So there's no increase in stories, just height? 
MR. TUVEL:  What's that?
THE WITNESS:  No. 
MR. MARTIN: There's no increase in stories.
MR. TUVEL: No. The number of stories are the same and as we mentioned before, the density has been reduced.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Frances? 
MS. BARTO:  I don't have any questions.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Melanie? 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  So that's the difference on the Franklin side. What's the difference in height on the Chestnut side now?  Is that taller    bigger, taller, more massive on that    on the Chestnut side now? 
MR. TUVEL:  You want to answer that. 
MR. NICHOLSON:  Yes. 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  I'm looking at   
MR. NICHOLSON:  This    on    on the Chestnut side, in the old design, that line was 50 feet above average grade.  This line is 54 feet 11 inches (indicating).
MS. McWILLIAMS:  So it's taller there.
MR. NICHOLSON:  It's taller there. 
But as you recall, on that street we're at 20 feet back from the street. 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  You're 20 feet back from the street? 
MR. NICHOLSON:  We're 20 feet back from Chestnut. 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Chestnut.
MR. NICHOLSON:  We have a 15 foot zoning setback and there's a 5 foot easement that was given or was reserved for the Village. So this building wall (indicating) is well back from its   
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Yes. 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes, and not only in terms of the other elevation as you remember from the last time, there there's a zero foot setback   
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Right.
MR. TUVEL:     because that's what's required in the zone, in the B 3 R along that frontage. 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  I mean, I like the rendering a lot better. I feel this is much more realistic than that (indicating).  But     I mean it's definitely better, I just feel that the Franklin side    or the Chestnut side, I mean, it's    you can see the    I struggle with the light and air that you see.
MR. NICHOLSON:  I'd just like to point out that    and it doesn't show in this view, but you recall Chestnut climbs.
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Oh, I know.
MR. NICHOLSON:  And Chestnut climbs   
MS. McWILLIAMS:  I'm very familiar with that area   
MR. NICHOLSON:    over half a story by the time you get to the end of our building. So    
MS. McWILLIAMS:  I've sat in traffic there pretty much every day. 
MR. NICHOLSON:  Yeah.  That's the mitigating factor with the height, right, but that the grade is going up.  And it's going up quickly. 
MS. McWILLIAMS: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Joel? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  Mr. Szabo    
THE WITNESS: Yes.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:    some of your testimony you talked about the light, air and spacing, that was your fourth prong of your positive criteria argument. 
THE WITNESS: Yes. 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: And you mentioned there'll be far more air and space inside the dwelling units? 
THE WITNESS:  Well, by raising the height of the ceilings, you're creating a more comfortable environment, lighting is brought in. It's taller. It's a better design, more comfortable. 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: Isn't that part of the criteria, isn't that typically related to the public, light, air, open space and not inside the building? 
THE WITNESS: Well, I think it's both because when you are looking at light, air and conditions, you're looking at not only the site design, but how the whole project is working in terms of compliance with the zoning and with the design features. 
MR. TUVEL: And I think just    I'm sorry, just to expand on your question that you just asked about, I guess it was purpose C, that Municipal Land Use mentioned    they both mentioned is I think you were indicating that the fact that the light, air and open space with the terraces provides a public benefit in terms from a visual standpoint as well as from a massing standpoint.
So in addition to inside the units, you're taking about   
THE WITNESS:  It's also related to the terracing and the way that the mass is handled on the Franklin side and the changes that have been made and improvement in the design at this site.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  I understand. I'm really glad you brought that up, Jason. That was going to kind of be my next question. I feel like it's a little bit of a swap meet here, right, so you    you reduced it by about 4,000 square feet? 
MR. TUVEL:  The building in total?  Correct.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  Yet increased in height by almost 5 feet, right? 
So it's a little bit of a swap. 
So the real question is, and I'm sure it'll be easy for you guys to figure out, have you compared the volume of the building originally, to the new volume? 
MR. TUVEL:  That would be something for the architect to answer again. 
Well, when you say volume, can you just clarify what that means? You mean square footage?
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: Cubic feet? 
MR. NICHOLSON:  I have not run that calculation. I understand what you're asking. I have not run it.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: I understand you don't have the numbers, but in your opinion, as somebody that designed both buildings, do you think it's about equal? Did the volume increase? 
It's hard to judge based on the exhibits, but I feel like you're saying, oh, we're bringing everything down, but in reality, it's a bigger building as well as a bit more light, air, space inside the building, which makes it less light and space on the site.
MR. NICHOLSON: Can you give me a couple of minutes? 
MR. TUVEL: Sure. Okay. 
Give him time to run that calculation.
MR. MARTIN:  Yes, that's fine. 
MR. TUVEL: I'm sure with the   
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: It's more    I don't expect you to calculate the volume. It's not realistic, but I just want to get an idea since you designed both of these what's your general feel on the volume? Do you think they're about equal?  Do you think it increased, decreased? What do you think? 
MR. NICHOLSON:  Off the top of my head, it's probably increased slightly, because the reduction in floor area on the fifth floor is 4,362, but the entire floor plane is about 25,000 square feet. So I think we're probably a little bit bigger in total volume. 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  Slightly.
MR. NICHOLSON:  But I really want to crunch the numbers to give you a hard number.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  Yes.  No, like I said, I don't expect you to sit there, that would be ridiculous but just wanted to get where you thought it was. I think that's pretty relevant when we're talking about taking a little bit of square footage out and you're actually making a taller building. So it's not a    I don't think it's a reduction. You're scaling it back from the streetscape, but it's still a massive building. The volume actually increases. And your argument is    one of your arguments of the positive criteria is that it    maybe you help restate about the light, air and open space. I don't want to misstate your argument on that.
THE WITNESS:  You have taller windows. You have setbacks to the building. You have other architectural features that break up the facade. When you look at light, air, zoning regulates light, that was the purpose behind creating zoning in the first place, way back when you created this. And we complied with the    substantially complied with the zoning for this    for this area. And if you compare the building you can see that you're still having a five story building on both sides of Chestnut and Franklin. So we're talking about 4 feet. And as a result of the design that incorporated that recommendation, 4 feet. So 4 feet, a little lower than this podium (indicating). So I don't see    I think that is di minimus, frankly, from what was approved. And for the benefit that I described, in exchange for that, in terms of, you know, reducing the density of the project, being able to provide a better amenity in order to kind of enhance the site, I mean architecturally I feel that's a far superior building. 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: I don't disagree with you. 
In your first prong you talked about, again, you were talking really fast, I was trying to take down notes really fast. 
THE WITNESS:  Sorry about that.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: You were talking about from the public health.
THE WITNESS:  General welfare.
Well, let's look at the purposes. Purpose A   
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: It's really important because we have to understand   
THE WITNESS: Purpose A, to encourage municipal action to guide the appropriate use or development of all lands in the state in a manner which promotes public health, safety, morals and general welfare.  That's a general statement. And generally speaking, we've satisfied that because we're advancing the purpose and the intent of your Master Plan. I spoke to that at the last hearing when we talked about the project, and implemented the vision that the Village contemplated for the site in the B 3 R zone.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  Okay. 
THE WITNESS:  And that's pretty straightforward.
MR. TUVEL: And also think about what we've done since the last application, just think about what we've done. The architecture, we all agree. So I'll throw that out. We all talked about that already. 
We've changed the amenity space, which I think was a big issue for the board and the public. And I kept saying "it complies," "it complies," which it did. But I think right now we have a better planning alternative with respect to the amenity space. This allowed us to do that by putting the terraces and the amenity space on that fifth floor. So that's a better functionality aspect of it. And in terms of density, everybody talks about the size of the building. You just said it yourself, you thought it was massive to some degree, but you really can't say that if you look at the zoning regulations that's our baseline. And we're below the impervious coverage amounts, we're below the density amounts, and we're below the FAR amounts. So from an intensity standpoint, you know, from looking at it objectively from the ordinance, there's no way that this could be viewed as an intense development based on the ordinance. 
But what we've been able to do in changing the plan is make the functionality of the building, create a better planning alternative, based on comments that we received back from the board, while decreasing the density.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  I understand all that. I guess I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that the    how we ended up here tonight because I'm sure Mr. Szabo, MR. NICHOLSON, I mean, you don't redesign a building, it takes a lot of time, you're well compensated, a lot of time and money went into redesigning this whole thing, just based on comments. It seems a little... 
MR. TUVEL:  So do you remember that at the initial application   
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  Sure.
MR. TUVEL:     one thing that we had to do was go to the architect    one of the conditions of the approval is that we would meet with an architectural review committee made up of your planner and maybe some of the board members, right? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  Sure.
MR. TUVEL:  We would have gotten to this point probably by doing that. So the client basically said, I know I'm going to have to make adjustments to this, based on the comments that the board had when I meet with the architectural review committee. How can I make this better? Well, we looked at it, and this is    I didn't look at it, but the client and the professionals looked at it, right, and this was a better alternative. So they said, well, we can make the architecture better, but reducing the density was part of it, the floor to ceiling height was a positive, and that's how we got here. 
So we were going to have to do that anyway.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: Okay.
MR. TUVEL:  So, I mean, that's kind of    and the result of that redesign was a variance, so we had to come back here. If it wasn't, we wouldn't be here.
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: Right.
MS. McWILLIAMS:  I just think that this was the obvious first choice to begin with, and it doesn't seem like it took that long to get to this huge leap to get to here. And I'm with Joel, and I'm wondering when you day it's, like, you know, we went back and thought about it. You know we thought let's go with everything you guys suggested sort of   
MR. TUVEL: But, so    so look at it this way, okay, so you hear a lot of applications before this board and you see a lot of applications. This is our application so we live and breathe it. We weren't just here for one month. We started in October of 2016 and heard comments over almost a year. 
So as your comments came through, obviously thoughts were in people's minds. So it wasn't like, Melanie, we got approved and next week David designed this building. So we understand the comments of the board. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  So, Jason, isn't it true that you have a fair amount of    you have more flexibility now without having affordable units in that building and putting them in The Enclave, you've got some flexibility to do different things that you wouldn't have been able to do. Is that    is that one of the reasons?  It seems to me it is. 
MR. TUVEL:  What do you mean by "flexibility"?
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Well, you've then rearranged the units so they can maximize profits. And so, you know, based off this, you know, you've got units in there that are market rate units that you can do more things with. You can become more flexible. So I think, you know, that's one of the reasons why we're here tonight is the fact that it has to do with they have more flexibility based on the fact that they're market rate units. And you could do more things to maximize the space and to maximize the rent. And that's fine. I mean, I think that's one of the reasons why they're doing it. 
MR. TUVEL:  The issue of the affordable units in The Enclave is also something that evolved over time.  It wasn't something that was part of the initial application. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: I don't have a problem with that. I think that's one of the reasons we're here.
MR. TUVEL: No, I just didn't want it to seem like, you know, we left here and then we just flipped a switch and this plan showed up. 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  I think we're just saying we don't believe that at all. I am.
MR. TUVEL:  Okay.  
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  All right. Well, we're half and half on that. 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Sorry, Joel.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  All right.  I don't have any    do you have any more questions? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  No.  That's it. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay.  Yes, I have no questions. We'll go to our professionals if they have questions. Kendra, do you have any questions for John? 
MS. LELIE:  Just one question with regards to the materials that    I don't think it's shown actually on this perspective, but the material that's surrounding the AC units, it's described as a metal screening.  Can you talk about how that mitigation    oh, there it is. Oh, there it is.
MR. TUVEL:  We thought that was a question for the architect.
THE WITNESS:  I thought that was an architectural question. 
MS. LELIE:  Well, I think it    I think it may be both, but is the screening similar in nature to materials of this buildings.
THE WITNESS:  I'll defer to the architect.
MR. NICHOLSON:  No.
MS. LELIE:  No? 
MR. NICHOLSON:  No, because it's a perforated metal screening that is designed to do two things; one is to cut down on noise transmission and the other is to make the units, so you can't see the units. 
MS. LELIE:  So, for instance, on the Chestnut Street side, on that rendering you don't necessarily see it, but this does    it does kind of go up to the    I guess within 5 feet of the parapet wall. What will you see?  I mean would it be in conformance with the architectural elements of the facade of the building? 
I think that's we're the    maybe the    some of the comment on the thought process about how you mitigated that. Yes, it's going to be 54 feet 11 inches. Yes, we still are    you know, we're within 58 feet of what the ordinance says would be perfect for this, but the materials will be in such a way that they are in conformance with one another so you wouldn't feel like there's these things just sticking up on the top of the roof? 
MR. NICHOLSON:  Well, if you recall, it's only 3 foot 6 inches tall   
MS. LELIE:  Right.
MR. NICHOLSON:    off the roof surface. And there is a small rise at the edge of the roof for flashing details and things like that. The design intent is to use the perforated screen, paint it a medium gray, because it disappears against the sky, so you don't    the idea is that you don't see it. It's not supposed to be part of the architecture. That's the design you have.
MS. LELIE:  Okay. That's the only question I had, is relating to the height issue. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Chris, do you have any questions? 
CHRIS: No, thank you.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  I have one more question.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Yes. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  One of the things you mentioned was the benefit, you said that you decreased the impervious coverage on the property. Is that right? 
MS. LELIE:  Yes. 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes. The reason    the reason that was the case and    yes, the    I think MR. NICHOLSON explained this, remember the amenity space, Councilman, that was near the railroad tracks that we initially had? So that's been removed and now that's become pervious or green space. And that's been enlarged. So there were a few spots on the site that we were able to provide more impervious    no, I'm sorry    more pervious surface. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Not a lot, but there is some.
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Okay.  
MS. McWILLIAMS:  That amenity space up on the roof, I know you said    I just want to clarify   
MR. TUVEL:  That's okay.
MS. McWILLIAMS: That's for everybody, anybody within the building that wants to use it will follow whatever rules and guidelines that exist to utilize that amenity space up there. 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes. There's like a plaza    there's a plaza that public amenity space, for all the floors of the building. 
MR. NICHOLSON: That's correct. 
MS. McWILLIAMS: So they can all use it? All right.  
MR. NICHOLSON: That's correct.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Andrew, do you have any questions?
MR. FERANDA:  No comment.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  I just want to know, what is the top height on the corner of the tower? Is that   
MR. NICHOLSON: (Indicating).
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Yes.  What is that? 
MR. NICHOLSON:  58 feet.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay. 
MR. NICHOLSON:  58 feet above average grade.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: And then what's the height at the back corner on Chestnut from the ground going up? 
MR. NICHOLSON:  That data isn't on my plan, if you'll give me a minute. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Yes.
MR. TUVEL:  Mr. Chairman, do you want to open it up to the public in regards to Mr. Szabo while MR. NICHOLSON is getting that information, just so we're using the time wisely? 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Yes, sure. 
Does anyone from the public want to ask questions of Mr. Szabo?
MR. UNLUSOY:  Yes, I have a quick one.  Thank you.  
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Sure.
MR. UNLUSOY:  Thank you. So   
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Just state your name again, just for the record. 
MR. UNLUSOY: Yes. Pulent Unlusoy, 102 Oak Street. 
So I have a traffic related question. So the southwest corner on Franklin, the access is controlled by a traffic light right there by the bridge across from the Broad Street, correct? You've got 150 parking places inside, and so the traffic light controlled area, if that backs up people are going to revert back to the exit that's on the east side of the building into Chestnut. So if you have a ton of cars trying to go onto Chestnut to access Franklin, MS. McWILLIAMS said that she sits there in traffic every day as is, with that kind of volume of traffic flowing out of Chestnut to Franklin, how is that planned to be handled?  Is there going to be a traffic light on Chestnut or Franklin corner? It's a traffic density nightmare the way I see it that this could turn into. So what are your plans and solutions for a traffic flow control at that spot? 
MR. TUVEL: So I guess you weren't here at the original application. 
MR. UNLUSOY: No, I was not.
MR. TUVEL: No, that's okay. And we talked a lot about this, but we submitted a traffic report and the board engineer and the board's traffic engineer reviewed it. And the applicant is responsible to pay a pro rata share contribution with respect to street improvements that are necessitated as a result of the application. And that was agreed to at the prior application, and that's been agreed to in connection with this application.
MR. UNLUSOY:  What street improvements are planned? 
MR. TUVEL: Again, I'm not    I'm not    I wasn't planning on going over this because we addressed it previously and there's nothing about the traffic aspect of the application that doesn't comply.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  In a general statement form, you know.
MR. TUVEL:  In general.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Andrew can answer in general. 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.  
MR. FERANDA:  At the previous hearing for the original application, there was extensive testimony, and the focus was on the traffic. There would be significant improvements to the traffic signal to allow the time to be more efficient so that the residents and retail use will be able to use that signal. 
And by efficiency of that reprogrammed signal, more traffic will be using that intersection than would Chestnut and the balance of the traffic is shown in the report to be acceptable levels    
MR. UNLUSOY: When you say   
MR. FERANDA:    after the improvements.
MR.  UNLUSOY: When you say the signal, you mean the signal over on the southwest corner?
MR. FERANDA:  At   
MR. UNLUSOY: How do you control the people not going out on to Chestnut to cause that congestion.
MR. FERANDA: Well, the residents and the retail use will have the option to use either driveway. If there's significant delay, as you're suggesting, if there's backup past the driveway then certainly that becomes a less desirable exit for vehicles, they would then use the signal because it will be reprogrammed, improved, and allow more residents out that driveway. So they have the option to use those driveways. And, again, there was a traffic study with detailed information showing that the delay balance would be at acceptable levels of service, which means not too significant a delay. With the change, and that's what we're talking about here, there's more retail, there's less residential, the change increases slightly. There's a few more trips. But improvements at the traffic signal are significant enough that it can handle the additional trips, as well as the site, typically residential units and 8,000   
MR. TUVEL: Yes.
MR. UNLUSOY: I apologize for not having been on the earlier hearings.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: No, that's okay. 
Did that answer your question? 
MR. UNLUSOY:  Not completely.  I have further questions, but I'll ask them later in the hearing.  
MS. McWILLIAMS: Then ask your questions. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: He's going to give a report after    I guess this is the only witness that they had left and then Andrew will fill it in a little more, but did you have any planner type questions for Mr. Szabo? 
MR.  UNLUSOY:  No. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  No?  Okay. 
Did you have any other witnesses? 
MR. TUVEL:  No.  I was just going to ask if we can take a two minute break, if that's okay.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Yes, sure.
MR. TUVEL:  Okay.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  All right Let's take a two  to three minute break.
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Really, two minutes? Really?
(Whereupon, a brief recess is taken.)
(MAYOR KNUDSEN is now present at the hearing at 9:16 p.m.)  
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay.  Let's call the meeting back to order. 
We'll have roll call, Michael.
MR. CAFARELLI:  MAYOR KNUDSEN? 
MAYOR KNUDSEN:  Here. 
MR. CAFARELLI:  COUNCILMAN VOIGT?
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Here. 
MR. CAFARELLI:  Mr. Joel? 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Here.
MR. CAFARELLI:  MR. SCHEIBNER? 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  Here. 
MR. CAFARELLI:  Mr. Torielli? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  Here.
MR. CAFARELLI:  MS. McWILLIAMS?
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Here. 
MR. CAFARELLI:  MS. BARTO?
MS. BARTO:  Here. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  CHIEF  Van Goor?
CHIEF  Van Goor:  Here.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Thanks, Michael.
MR. TUVEL: Mr. Chairman, I just want to make one point that I was talking about with counsel, which is we do need a variance for the height in terms of the average grade to the roof line, but I just want to make one thing clear, is that in the initial proposal where we were at 50 feet in terms of the average grade with the roof appurtenances, it was still 58 feet. In this one we're exactly the same instance where there's nothing above 58 feet. So we're still within that range where none of the roof appurtenances go above 58 feet. I just wanted to make that clear. There's the building's height and then there's the roof appurtenances. And in terms of that, we're still in the same boat as we were the last time. I just wanted to make that clear.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. Thanks.
All right.  We're going to move on to the board's experts. 
Kendra, would you like to start? 
MS. LELIE: Sure. So we have a    excuse me    a report dated November 15th, we went through this project, it's been pretty clearly gone through all that. With regards to    there's really two issues that I don't think were specifically dealt with, so under number 2.0 zoning compliance, which is Sheet 2 of 8, so mixed use is permitted in a B 3 R, as you all know. However, there's a condition that when you mix residential and nonresidential, in this particular zone that a portion of it obviously has to be for affordable housing. There is a section within this zoning district that allows for a developer to request from the Planning Board an exception from that, which is found under subsection (g), so I have turned to page 3 of 8. And in    on that page you'll see those items that    there are specific conditions that need to be met, that you, as the Planning Board, need to find and the applicant needs to talk about. And I know that you're familiar with The Enclave application. And we provided a little bit further down what has been approved, which is at The Enclave    so the idea is that the affordable housing units, of which there were ten originally, I believe there are ten; is that right? Yes, originally there were ten. In this particular development now with the reduction in the number of units, a requirement of nine is necessary. And what's being proposed is that that go to The Enclave site. And so on The Enclave site we're looking at 39 market units that 8 special needs. What we provided for you was to say there's 39 units. They are required six affordable housing units. And in this project, nine affordable housing units are required. So obviously then 15 is what's going to be necessary in The Enclave. So what this section of the ordinance requires is that the applicant and the developer demonstrate that there's a realistic plan, so there may    you may need to have some testimony, I think, from the applicant to give you a better idea of what's being proposed at The Enclave that their    you know, that those units are going to be completed within a certain timeframe, that it's in conformance with the zoning requirements. At this point we know we have an application that's been approved, but I don't think necessarily that the number of units, affordable housing units to accommodate what's coming from this particular application have been discussed, and that's something that I think the applicant should talk about, and then the execution of an agreement. So the Planning Board does have some work to do on this because in some instances it's    the mixed use, to some degree, could be considered a conditional use because there are conditions that there's affordable housing units provided on site. They're not being on site. They're proposing to go off site. I think that needs to be flushed out a bit more for you, as the planning board, to find that they've met these particular conditions. So that's kind of point number one. I don't know if you guys want to deal with that now. There's really only one other point that I have to make through our report. 
MR. MARTIN: Well, Kendra, that's a good point. 
What would the second point be before we have   
MS. LELIE: It's the exterior amenity areas. There's a minor issue on Chestnut Street.
MR. MARTIN: You want to hold that in abeyance, and address    that's probably a good idea, and I think we can both stipulate that we would do a developer's agreement on tis.
MR. TUVEL: Yes. I'll agree with Kendra. I think maybe    I had Mr. Szabo explain the off site units, but if you want him to just go into a little bit more detail, the principals of the two entities are similar, so it's obviously an agreement between the two principals as to the off site. It will be done in accordance with a plan that we have that's been approved by this board, so that's already there. It meets, as your planner indicated, the amount of units between the two    between the two developments, the nine for this one and the six for The Enclave. So that's met. So the completion of such units within the phase in timeframe required to complete the development, that would be part of the agreement that would be executed, so that timeframe would likely be in there, so that's not a big deal. Again, the principals are the same, so it's all within one person's control. So I think we meet all these prongs. This board is aware, I know, for instance    I was not the attorney on it, but I know that there was substantial testimony heard from not only the Applicant, the Applicant's professionals, but also somebody who was going to be implementing the affordable housing at The Enclave, so I know that this board has all that information, but what I can stipulate to is that we meet all these prongs and there will be 15 units there. If there are any other questions that you have, I mean, that's pretty much    it's meeting those requirements. I don't know what else you would want to hear from us.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: When was that agreement put together? 
MR. TUVEL: What's that?
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: You guys put that agreement together or did we put that agreement together? 
MR. TUVEL:  Well    
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: It's a joint effort? 
MR. MARTIN: It's a joint effort.
MR. TUVEL: Yes, that's a very common in developer's agreement between municipalities, based on Planning Board approval that's    you guys get to lay into us on some things about how quickly it has to get done and we have to have insurance on it and things of that nature, in terms of that, but that's standard practice.
MR. MARTIN: And Chris is pretty    MR. RUTISHAUSER is pretty active in all that? 
MR. TUVEL: We have to post a bond, you know, inspection fees, those are    those are things   
MS. McWILLIAMS:  So are you increasing the number of units that are at Enclave then? They were    what were they at?  Is it the 39 that they were at, and so now they'll be at 45 or... 
MR. TUVEL:  No.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  No. 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  No? 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  No.  What they propose and what was approved. They're just getting credit for it.
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Okay. 
MR. TUVEL:  So if there's any other information you want, but I know you're fully familiar with The Enclave project so...
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Thank you. 
MAYOR KNUDSEN:  I just have one quick question. Kendra, you're not suggesting that the introduction of the retail space created a scenario that required the affordable housing to be on site because the ordinance does state that the affordable housing can be   
MR. TUVEL:  Off site. 
MAYOR KNUDSEN:     off site. 
MS. LELIE:  Correct. 
MR. TUVEL:  Correct.
MS. LELIE:  No, no, no, I was not    if I    if I stated that, I misspoke.  It    
MAYOR KNUDSEN:  I just want to be clear on what you're exactly saying.
MS. LELIE:  What the ordinance says is that a mixed use is    has residential and nonresidential. When residential is proposed as part of the mixed use, there's an affordable housing component required on site, but it gives you the flexibility to do it off site, provided the criteria that the counsel just mentioned is met. 
MAYOR KNUDSEN:  Okay.  So I may have just misunderstood what you were saying.
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.  And we will meet all these prongs, and I believe, even your planner    I know Beth has also opined about the off site units being eligible for the credits for the    for The Enclave.  So all these prongs have been met in subsection (g) of the B 3 R.
MS. LELIE:  And I just wanted to make sure it was on the record. 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.  No, that's fine.
MS. LELIE:  It's part of the zoning and it is obviously different from your prior application.
MR. TUVEL:  That's fine. 
MS. LELIE:  So the only other question that we had that I don't think we've necessarily specifically dealt with is on sheet    or sorry.
MR. TUVEL:  The furniture outside. 
MS. LELIE:  Yes.  No.  It's page 7 of 8, 4.1, exterior amenity area for Chestnut Street. 
I know you had mentioned about the    you know, the upper space, the space on the roof the   
MR. TUVEL:  That's the outdoor furniture on Chestnut Street. 
MS. LELIE:  On Chestnut    yes.  So    well, and I'm wondering if it might be more than just considered outdoor furniture.  So Chestnut Street, there is an area that is being designated for the outdoor amenity area, and what we asked for is that they provide a design of that space. And the reason why is because there is some pedestrian movement occurring on that sidewalk, and the way that it traverses the front of the building, we just want to make sure that they're meeting the minimum requirement for the space, you know, for the square footage. And also that it's functional. It's not just a flat plastic area that nothing ever happens. The outdoor amenity area is obviously meant to be functional and an amenity for the residents. And so we just ask that the Applicant provide a design for that space, whether it's use of outdoor furniture or planters or a mix of something.
MR. TUVEL: Yes. That's fine. We outlined it on the plan to show the percentage, but if as a condition of approval we need to submit something that Kendra that's a little bit more detailed in terms of furniture and plantings and things of that nature, that's perfectly acceptable. 
MS. LELIE:  And those are all the comments I have. The Applicant has indicated that they're going to comply with the planting requirements that we have in the ordinance, specifically in the letter    
MR. TUVEL: Yes.
MS. LELIE: And the architectural we've already talked about. The only thing that they're not proposing to necessarily follow our recommendation on is the canopies, and I don't    I really, I don't think it makes a difference one way or the other with the canopy. But it would be a nice element from a pedestrian scale, but if there's some issues which was described that there are some height issues, especially as you get to    I think it was Chestnut Street, with where the canopy, kind of, was as far as height was concerned or headroom, then I understand that it's not necessarily feasible. But other than that, they've taken out all of the building height appurtenance issues that we brought up on page 5 of 8, so there's really nothing to comment on that at this point because those variances are not needed for those items, for the appurtenances. So I really don't have any other comments. Any questions? 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Kendra, you did    on page 6, you talked about consideration of the    you talked about appearances of the surrounding area from a height perspective. Can we just get some more    I know, Jason, I asked you this at some point for more clarification as to how this is relative to    and I know you talked about this before. I don't have it here, so just help us understand what the surrounding area is from a height perspective. 
MR. TUVEL:  All right.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Jeff, do you have any questions for Kendra?
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  I do not.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  David? 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  Yes, help me get clarifications on the affordable housing component at The Enclave, as approved it includes enough that this    it can absorb the units from this development? 
MS. LELIE: They require 15. My understanding is they received approval for 15. I wasn't here for that application so...
MR. TUVEL:  Yeah, so   
MS. LELIE:  Okay.
MR. TUVEL: Correct. So at The Enclave project, which I believe there was a lot of testimony on that, specifically from the United Way person that was going to implement it, but, yes, there would be 15 units that would be approved. 
MR. SCHEIBNER: Because of the nature of the affordable housing, it isn't separate units. And I just want a clarification that it was sufficient, so that there's actually no change in what was approved for the United Way in order to absorb the affordable housing requirement for this developer.
MR. TUVEL: That's correct. Yes. And we vetted that with your planner regarding that issue. 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  I just needed clarification. Thank you.
MR. TUVEL:  That's okay.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  James? 
CHIEF  Van Goor:  No questions.
MAYOR KNUDSEN:  No questions. 
MS. BARTO:  I don't have any questions. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Melanie? 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  No. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Joel? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  I have no questions. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay.  Chris? 
MR. MARTIN:  Raise your right hand, sir. 
Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God? 
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Yes, I do.
C H R I S T O P H E R   R U T I S H A U S E R,
Having been duly sworn, testifies as follows: 
MR. MARTIN: And, MR. TUVEL, you stipulate to the village engineer   
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
MR. MARTIN:     as being a professional engineer? 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
MR. MARTIN: Go ahead, Chris. 
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Okay, thank you. I was presented for this application, there's a tremendous similarity   
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Sorry to interrupt. Did anyone from the public have any questions for Kendra?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. Sorry. Go ahead. 
MR. RUTISHAUSER: As MR. TUVEL has presented, this application has tremendous similarity to what has already been presented to the board, so a lot of my comments are similar to both. There are a few exceptions.  Some parking spaces were widened from 8 feet to 9 feet. All of the spaces, as proposed, in this application were shown to be 9 feet wide and 18 feet deep. That's a nice, generous parking space. 
They also show on their plans for refuse collection areas around the parking lot. They've added a bicycle rack for residents on the interior. I don't believe they had that on the prior application. I do have a request for the Applicant to consider possibly one or two backless, like resting benches, for the pedestrians along the Franklin Avenue frontage. I have been working a lot with Age Friendly Ridgewood. And they're stressing that the Franklin Avenue sidewalk corridor is a primary walking route for their senior population from Ridgecrest to reach a number of the food stores and the shopping district, and on their way back with, let's say, purchases from Stop and Shop, a resting bench or two in this area would be very beneficial to those folks before they cross at the Broad Street light, went through the train station and back at Ridgecrest. It's just something to be considered.
MR. MARTIN: I believe there would be a stipulation to that? 
MR. TUVEL: Yes. That's fine.
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Okay. That would be great, thanks. This application had a geotechnical report that I don't recall was in the initial application. The geotechnical report mentioned several ground densification methodologies that may be considered. They are based on ramp, piers, steel piles, micro piles. My concern on behalf of the Village would be if any of these methodologies were employed, that the Applicant be required to provide for seismic monitoring at the property line to ensure off site seismic problems do not occur. I have, in my own experience, had concrete demolition occurring where we had a vibration damage two blocks away where a house's foundation on the sand matched the frequency of our demolition work and they got large cracks in their foundations. I'd like to make sure we could avoid that for any of the buildings in that area with any of the densification methodologies they may consider. The geotechnical report also mentions groundwater observed. That triggered something in my memory I added it to my report a map that we have had in our files from 1980    no    1881, that shows a stream that transects the parcel and goes through to the central business district. We do know that that stream now acts subsurfacely and it is a conduit for a contamination issue we have on Chestnut Street that reached all the way down East Ridgewood, so we provided that information to the applicant. Just review it, see if it has any bearing to what they propose. And that's basically it, if the board has any questions. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Jeff, do you have any questions? 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  I do not.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  David? 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  No questions.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  James?
CHIEF  Van Goor:  No questions.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Susan? 
MAYOR KNUDSEN:  I have no questions. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Frances? 
MS. BARTO:  No questions.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Melanie? 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  I don't have any questions. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Joel? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  No, sir. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay.
MR. MARTIN: Just in terms of the seismic, I'm a little slow so can you help me out with that? So Jason is pretty quick and I'm just sort of confused. How can we make this happen? What do we need? 
MR. RUTISHAUSER: I would recommend that any resolution of approval the board considers, that there be an obligation for seismic monitoring if ground densification processes are employed during the construction phases.
MR. MARTIN: Is this just during construction?
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Well, I don't see any reason to densify the ground once they're done.
MR. MARTIN: The railroad had some issues I've have in other towns so...
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Well, I mean, the railroad is there. They do provide    there is some vibration from the railroad, that should be relatively stable now. The most recent work was done ten years ago, I believe.
MR. MARTIN: So it's just during construction. 
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Yes. If they    again, if they follow certain recommendations in the geotechnical report, I would like the resolution to have the ability that the Village could provide for monitoring to ensure no off site issues occur.
MR. TUVEL: That's a common request on projects of this size where the monitoring takes place during construction. It's usually recommended by the geotech report as well, so that's fine.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Thank you. So I guess you'd stipulate to review construction with the engineer and then any requirements   
MR. TUVEL: Yes, there's vibration monitoring during the course of construction to ensure that it doesn't affect, have a negative impact on it; that's fine.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay. 
MAYOR KNUDSEN: I have another    because that was actually my question, I was trying to formulate in my mind, so thank you, that was just what I wanted to know how to monitor that. So thank you.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Does the applicant have any questions for Chris? 
MR. TUVEL: No. Think we would comply with his letter as applicable I don't think we're a major development, that was the only item    
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Yes, there were a couple issues with stormwater management that we were talking about. 
MR. TUVEL:  So we'll agree to work with you on those issues.  Okay.  So we're fine.
CHAIRMAN JEL: Anything else to add, Chris?
MR. RUTISHAUSER:  No.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Does the public have any questions for our engineer?
MR. UNLUSOY:  Yes, I have one. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Sure. Come forward, state your name   
MR. UNLUSOY:  So let's just say    sorry.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Because we're recording it. 
MR. UNLUSOY:  Sure.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: State your name.
MR. UNLUSOY: Pulent Unlusoy, 102 Oak Street. Chris, let's say during the demolition efforts they    something happened and a crack occurred on the foundation of a nearby house. Who is liable? Is the city liable because they permitted this to happen? Or is the contractor liable because they didn't follow some of the seismic recommendations?
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Okay. That's a liability question and I'm an engineer, so I don't pretend to be an attorney. I'm not qualified to. But if it could be shown that work on the development project was the cause of that, then that individual has grounds for a possible claim. Again, there's a lot of legal niceties that are involved. It's not that quick and easy. You know, the condition of the structure has something to do with if there is a damage, the nature of any demolition work, you know, if the demolition work was, as I gave you an example using a hoe hammer, hydraulic hammering then there might be grounds. If the demolition work was simply using a loader, an excavator to remove the building, there may be less of a case because those are very common practice.
MR. MARTIN: There's permit safety, a number of conditions, there's going to be insurance   
MR. TUVEL: It's part of the application, we will have to comply with all construction code requirements, all of these are construction code requirements. But, yes, Chris, we also have to post a bond and also provide necessary certificates of insurance.
MAYOR KNUDSEN: So here's another question, questions beget questions, right? 
Did we notice residents    I know sometimes we get a notification that somebody is doing demo work or something, you know, in your neighborhood thing, how do we notice residents that something like that would be going on? What is the procedure that we follow? 
MR. RUTISHAUSER: It's part of our building permit, the building department permit for demolition. 
For example, right now our contractor will be demoing the garage at the shelter property. They have to notify the neighbors. They have to provide documentation of that notification when they apply for a permit. They also have to show that all the utilities have been shut off, for us the sanitary sewer is done through our offices, we witness the lateral that's excavated and capped properly. PSE&G has to provide those letters from gas, electric cable, all the utilities, water company, and so forth.
MAYOR KNUDSEN: And then what is the    is it the same 200 foot radius that gets notified or do we go beyond that, because as this gentleman is speaking from Oak Street, I don't know where his house is on Oak Street. It could be right across the street, it could be 500 feet away, you know, so I'm just wondering what is the distance of notification?
MR. RUTISHAUSER: I think the building department doesn't use 200 feet, I think just they use adjacent to the property. I'm not 100 percent certain. We could certainly look into that.
MR. MARTIN:  Or areas that they'd be engineering would determine could be affected.
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Again, they have    I think they have a statutory established criteria. Again, I don't know if it's in the board's purview. It's up to your, counsel, whether, as part of an approval resolution, a notification could be done on a certain radius distance as the Mayor has suggested.
MR. MARTIN: No. That would be definitely under the construction aspects. 
MR. RUTISHAUSER:  So I would have to defer to what the building department is using.
MR. MARTIN:  Right. There's one other issue I think the Mayor brought up there's also a major soil movement permit    
MR. TUVEL: Correct.
MR. MARTIN: And that will be outlined as it normally is, in terms of securing any kind of soil that's taken off site or brought into the site.
MR. TUVEL: Right. 
MR. MARTIN: And   
MR. TUVEL: So Chris's report addressed that and we're complying with everything in his report. We obviously are also subject to Bergen County Soil Conservation District as well, and we would comply with those regulations in addition to that. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. 
Andrew, do you have a further report to provide? 
MR. FERANDA: Again, as noted in other professional's reports, the new application is significantly similar to the original approval. And that's the case for traffic and parking as well. Access and circulation, there's no change. The Applicant has agreed to the comments in our letter, one of which I state that they're subject to the original conditions of the original approval. They've agreed to that. For the parking, there was a question about is the parking    now for the new application, does it meet the ordinance. There are now 60 units of residential based on the 15 one bedroom and 45 two bedroom units there will be 117 parking spaces required by RSIS. For the retail space, 8,164 square foot at one space per 250 square foot, there would be 33 spaces required. That's a total of 150. Previously the requirement for the residential was 127. That's ten more. Because of the reduction of the bedrooms, it's now ten less. The retail space was 23. It's now 33. That's ten more. There's a trade off. It's the same number of parking spaces. So they do meet the ordinance requirements in both cases, retail and residential. Again, any parking conditions are subject to the original approval. Traffic wise, the site does have a slight increase in trips in the morning time. The total trip increase would be six trips. That would be six trips in and out of the site. That would not be a significant increase knowing that they have two driveways to distribute six trips in and out, that's roughly three in/three out with the two driveways. It's a very small increase in the trips. In the p.m. it would be an additional 15 in and on Saturday it would be an additional 22 trips. Again, based on the trips from the site distributing over the two driveways, during a peak hour timeframe, the additional trips is not a significant increase and can be accommodated within the analysis that was provided in the original traffic report. The parking, with the new application there was a temporal analysis, a temporal demand analysis, what that is an analysis throughout the day of how many parking spaces will be available during each hour of the day based on information available for retail and residential. Residential typically peaks overnight when residents are in their units. Retail typically peaks during the day. There's an offsetting, this is part of the shared analysis that was provided. And based on the shared analysis, during a weekday there will be a minimum of 32 available parking spaces, and on a weekend there would be a similar number of 32 parking spaces available, in addition to those being used. So we have 150 parking spaces on site. There will be 32 spaces available within that 150 parking spaces, based on the analysis of demand for the residential and retail use. So with that said, the new mix of retail and residential, there is adequate parking within the provided 150 parking spaces. 
And the last comment I would have is the fair share analysis that was done for the previous approval still applies. They've agreed to do that as part of the original approval, and that would remain as part of this approval. The fair share analysis was not tied to number of vehicles for the site per square footage.  They have agreed to construction of certain items or improvement of the traffic signal. The agreement for the original approval was they're contributing or there'll be the fourth leg at a currently a three leg approach at the intersection, they're the fourth leg. They will contribute 25 percent, I think was in the original agreement. And they've agreed to that already, so that still applies. It's not based on the number of units or intensity of the site. The one condition of the original approval that still applies was the look back study, and I think it's more important that that look back study done now with the increase in the retail space, not knowing the tenants that will be in there, the travel demand for that retail space will be picked up in that look back study, and that can be used to program the traffic signal so that it's appropriate for the use that comes into the site. And that would be my last comment.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. Thanks. 
Jeff, do you have any questions of Andrew?
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: I actually have a question for Chris I forgot to ask. It has to do with the soil, soil permits.
MR. RUTISHAUSER:  Sure.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: So there's a soil permit. There's cubic yards estimate of 2300 and 4300 cubic yards of soil being shipped back and forth. How many truckloads is that? 
MR. RUTISHAUSER:  Generally figure about 15, 16 a truckload. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Okay. So that's a six, seven    600    no, I'm sorry. 
MR. RUTISHAUSER: The Applicant provided a range of their displaced soil movement. They haven't been able to provide completely, I think that may be related to some environmental issues they have to address first also.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Right.
MR. RUTISHAUSER: So say you want the 2500. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Yeah. Let's go on the high end, 4300. 
MR. RUTISHAUSER:  Okay. 2500 at 16 yards is about 156 trucks, and what was the other number? 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: 43.
MR. RUTISHAUSER: 43, again at 16, you're talking 268.75, 269 rounded up 270 truckloads. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Thank you.
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Those truckloads, that would be tandems or tri axle, 72,000 pounds to 80,000 pounds gross vehicle weight. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Is there any issues with any of the roads being able to support that weight? 
MR. RUTISHAUSER: We wouldn't want them necessarily on residential streets, but they're going to go down Franklin Avenue, a county road. They'll get on to Maple Avenue, a county road, and then depending where they go, they'll probably the county routes through the Village and then to the end destination. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: So, obviously, there's going to be some kind of a schedule for that so it doesn't disrupt... 
MR. RUTISHAUSER: Yes. The would need a resolution that's going to be prepared for the council, for the other mayor soil permits they need to provide a trucking route. Police department and I will review that, and they'll post some escrowed funds. We would look at restricting trucking during prime walk to school times or school inflow and outflow times for these, one of these other soil permits that I presented to council, I had stipulations that no trucking in front of the religious institutions at the very start of the trucking route was having an event, again, so as not to interfere with that. Those    the stipulations I have in the resolution for the governing body are usually about eight to ten items. If there's anything specific the board would like to be considered or included, feel free to let me know. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Thank you. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Questions for Andrew?
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  I don't think so.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Dave? 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  Just to clarify, the slight increase in the number of trips is due to the increased amount of retail space? 
MR. FERANDA:  That would be the retail space, correct.
MR. SCHEIBNER:  That's all.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  James?
CHIEF  Van Goor:  No questions.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Susan? 
MAYOR KNUDSEN:  No questions.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Frances? 
MS. BARTO:  No questions. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Melanie? 
MS. McWILLIAMS: A question, I used to remember this off the top of my head, but I don't right at the moment. When was the traffic study done that we're basing this on? When    how long ago was it? 
MR. FERANDA: That was part of the original study that was done for the  
MS. McWILLIAMS: For the Village. 
MR. FERANDA: Correct. 
MS. McWILLIAMS: Before 2015, that was 2015, right? Or 2016? 
MR. FERANDA: That was 2015, correct. 
MS. McWILLIAMS: February 2016? I believe even that was the person that did that study or if I recall correctly his testimony in February of 2016 or whatever was that the traffic study should be redone, I think it was, every two to three years. And I'm wondering, I mean, we can say all we want it's going to increase this, you know, a couple of carloads or car trips in and out, and I know there's a science behind it, but we all live it and sit in the traffic backed up past where this all will be and I mean we still don't know what exists for retail, what's going in that retail space. Is there worth    I mean is there any    are we left with any ability to see another traffic study done, an updated traffic study. 
MR. TUVEL: That's actually in your conditional approval.
MS. McWILLIAMS: Okay.
MR. TUVEL: No, I just wanted to answer your question.
MS. McWILLIAMS: Yes.
MR. TUVEL: It ties in to the approval that we previous got and also the condition that Andrew put in his letter that we would agree to as to this approval, as well. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Joel? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: No questions.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: So the look back will start after they're approval for all the residential and commercial is approved and then when it's fully tenanted? 
MR. FERANDA: Correct.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: And then you start, is it a year, what is the look back? 
MR. FERANDA: A year would be a good timeframe. That doesn't mean all the units have to be filled or all the retail. There are ways in traffic, you can work on a rate, if half the retail is filled, if they don't have a tenant in all of the retail space they can determine that half of the retail wasn't used and maybe a couple of the units weren't used. And they could work up a rate for that, and then multiply that by the empty spaces. But a year after would give you a good idea of the occupancy, it will be sufficient to get a good rate developed.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. 
MAYOR KNUDSEN: I just have a question.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Yes. Sure.
MAYOR KNUDSEN: You just refreshed my memory on something, and I could be misremembering, so    at one point we were discussing this application and there was a discrepancy on some of the traffic numbers, and I seem to recall there was some question as to whether or not we should go back out and do those counts to just corroborate the numbers or do a study. Am I not remembering that or is that   
MR. MARTIN: I think your memory is accurate. My recollection is that Andrew suggested that may be a more material study if it was done after as a look back as conditions change. Am I right about that? 
MR. FERANDA: Right. That was the discussion. We were looking at the signal, itself, and how that was analyzed and maybe me looking at that intersection and the thought was we could do it now and get the existing conditions, but that would not tell us much of what needs to be done once the building comes in, and that's why we decided on the look back, because that would take into account the actual impact of the occupied building and then they would have to mitigate impacts, adjust the signal timing based on the traffic that's actually coming from the site. If we count now, we're just recounting existing conditions and it doesn't really have the site traffic built in.
MR. MARTIN: And I believe the Applicant would abide by those recommendations. 
MR. TUVEL: Yes. We already agreed to that the first time. And we agree to those now. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Do you have any questions for Andrew? 
MR. TUVEL:  No.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Does anyone from the public have any questions for our traffic engineer?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Seeing none. All right. I guess we're up to the public testimony. Is there anyone from the public that wants to testify, to present any facts? (No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Seeing there are none, we'll have a motion to open to the public comment. 
MS. McWILLIAMS: I offer.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. Melanie. Second? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: Second. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  All in favor?  (Whereupon, all Board Members respond in the affirmative.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Anyone opposed? (No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  All right. We'll open for the public comment. 
Does anyone from the public want to come up and make a comment on this application?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay. Motion to close to the public comment. 
Is there a motion? 
MAYOR KNUDSEN:  Motion.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Susan. And second? 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Second. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Second's, Melanie. 
All in favor?  (Whereupon, all Board Members respond in the affirmative.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Anyone opposed? (No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL: All right. So you can make a closing statement.
MR. TUVEL: I think at this point you've heard all of the testimony. I think that what I said in my initial remarks is the arguments that we've put forth which is the following; after the initial approval, I know, as I said, it was permitted as of right and complied with all the regulations. However, during the course of those proceedings, not just at the end, but during the course of the entire seven hearing process that we had, there were comments that were made by the board in connection with various things. And I think the two major issues that were brought up were one was the architecture of the building, which we think we've significantly addressed in connection with this revision. The other was the use of the exterior amenity space, which I think we've made serious adjustments to, to the betterment of the project. I think that the one variance that resulted from the architectural adjustment as well as a decrease in density does not    meets the (c)(2) criteria test, we've provided ample evidence demonstrating that certain purposes of the Municipal Land Use Law are met. On Franklin Avenue the actual height of the building and the street are actually less than what was previously approved by the board based on the actual    because of the setback. In terms of the negative criteria, as your traffic engineer indicated, there's no negative impacts with respect to traffic, which are typically issues related to height. In addition to that, we've reduced the density.  As I said before, the density in this zone is 35 units per acre, which means that we can build 70 units on this property because the property is over two acres. The initial proposal that this board approved for 32.8 units    sorry, 32.8 units per acre. 
Based on this revision, going down to 60, we're now at 29.8 units per acre, so under 30. So this project is significantly less from a density standpoint. In addition to that, we've decreased the impervious coverage by adding more green space by eliminating the exterior amenity by the train track and putting more landscaping and things of that nature there. So I think we've met the negative criteria for the (c)(2) variance that we've requested. In addition to the site plan and the soil movement permit, if I could just recap, we've agreed to comply with your traffic engineer's report. We've agreed to comply with your civil engineer's report. We've addressed, I think, all the items in your planner's report. The affordable housing that will be off site, not at this location. And we meet all of the ordinance requirements with respect to that. In terms of your planner's report, as well, we went through some of the variances that she brought up there; most notably, the exterior roof appurtenances. We've reduced all those to make sure that they're compliant with the ordinance. That was something that was raised. We went back and forth as to what was an accessory structure, what was a principal structure, and in order to be  conservative on the issue, we've eliminated the height of the roof appurtenances so they comply. We've also eliminated the rooftop coverage issue that your planner suggested was violated in the letter in our plan, by reducing the amount of equipment on the roof. So we've complied with all of those ordinance requirements. Like I said before, the initial proposal was for 50 feet for the building height from grade. Right now we're at 54 feet 11 inches. However, the initial building went up to 58 feet with respect to the roof appurtenances. This building also goes up to 58 feet with respect to the roof appurtenances. 
So I think if you take the totality of the revisions that we've made from the initial proposal to this proposal, it's a much better planning alternative to the Village and was based off the dialogue that we had with this board and the public at the initial meeting. So I would respectfully request that the board grant the application as proposed.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Thank you.
MR. MARTIN:  Chair, point of order. Kendra, Jason mentioned something about the (c)(2) variance, which is the variance that's at issue?  I just want to be sure of that.
MS. LELIE:  That I agree with that? Yes. 
MR. MARTIN:  I happen to agree as well. 
MS. LELIE:  Yes, I do.
MR. MARTIN: All right. So the variance, the one variance on this application is the (c)(2) variance.
MR. TUVEL: Correct.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: All right. Do I have a motion to formally close the hearing and go into decision mode? 
MR. SCHEIBNER: So moved. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay. Dave? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: Second. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Second is Joel. All in favor? 
(Whereupon, all Board Members respond in the affirmative.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Anyone opposed? (No response.)
CHAIRMAN JOEL: So we formally close. Jeff, you can start, provide your thoughts.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Yes. A couple of things on the nonresidential space. I know we put a stipulation in The Enclave where we requested any time a new tenant went into that space that they would require Planning Board to compare the intensity of use was not so overwhelming that it created a parking issue. I'm just wondering if you might consider that as a stipulation? I'm having some problems with the benefits outweighing the detriments. I mean, I don't see how unless    there has to be winning argument here, to the benefits and detriments. And I'm having some problems trying to wrap my head around that. There were a couple of outstanding issues that we're going to look at, Jason. One is the height of this building relative to everything else in the area. And then you've got to look at some of the sight lines as it relates to people on the other side of Franklin looking at the building. And I'd ask for those, I know we're right now in decision mode, but they may help. They may help a little bit. 
MR. TUVEL: Yes, we can provide that information to your planner. That's fine. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Okay. 
MS. McWILLIAMS: Are you were asking for that as a conditions or before you vote? Before you even     
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  No, no, I guess I'm asking for a condition. We need to make sure that    I mean if you look at the sight line that I really can't see that, you know, the height of the building, if you're looking at the other side of Franklin. That would be one thing I was hoping, you know, we could take a look at, if there is a problem, then we really can address that. Is that okay? 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes. We can work with your planner, as a condition of approval, to provide the appropriate sight lines. That's fine. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Okay. Yeah, so those are my    my concerns. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Any comment whether you're favorable, unfavorable? 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Yes, I am    I'm inclined to say yes. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. Dave? 
MR. SCHEIBNER: My feeling is that it's a number of tradeoffs. The volume, the actual enclosed volume of the building I think is a little bit bigger, but it has probably less visual impact. So that's    I mean, that's a good trade. The intensity of use of the residential side is going down, going up in the retail. Again, it's pretty much a wash. The amenity area, I think, is far more useful, the outdoor amenity area. That is a definite improvement. As far as the visibility of the fifth floor on the south elevation from Franklin Avenue, if you just kind of guesstimate that the distance to the other side of the street is maybe 60 feet, from    well, maybe 70 feet from the front of the building to the other side, you can kind of visualize it's probably, you know, like a 30 degree angle. And from the parapet to the top of the fifth floor over a 58 foot distance, that would be like another 6 feet or so. I believe from that particular spot you probably aren't going to see a lot on the fifth floor. I'm just kind of guesstimating. But, you know, it's going to be visible from some places, and I don't think that's a terrible thing. The fact that it's set back    it's also set back from the west side a little bit, too, if the elevation I was looking at is correct, the fifth floor doesn't go all the way to the edge of the fourth floor on the west side. So it's    I don't think that imposes, so I'm inclined to approve.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Okay. James. 
CHIEF  Van Goor:  I wasn't here the first time it was approved, but I agree with Dave. I think by setting it back to make it look shorter, I think is a little better look better. And I think the rendering is a lot better than the first one that was approved. So I would be inclined to say yes.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay.
MR. MARTIN:  With the satisfaction of fire code? 
CHIEF  Van Goor:  Yes. As long as we stick to the code   
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
CHIEF  Van Goor:    and see how it goes. 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes, of course. And that's in Chris's letter, as well.
MR. MARTIN: Through the Chair, since the Mayor was able to address thing that she requested we put it to a vote. 
MAYOR KNUDSEN: I was in church actually so just for the record.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: You addressed the closing statement.
MAYOR KNUDSEN: Yes. No, I'm actually going to speak to the special needs units. I don't know if you recall, the Sealfons' building, because technically they're not in The Enclave either, and I think there's some confusion here, right.
MR. NICHOLSON: Yes. 
MAYOR KNUDSEN: So I think the    what is accomplished here is a benefit to the community at large because these special needs units are very much needed, and the opportunity to provide that is critical for some people, crucial for their family members people so I mean, that's a good    it's a good outcome.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Yes, you can watch. Frances?
MS. BARTO: My thoughts are, you know, this is a much more attractive plan and I don't think we deviate much from what was initially approved. And I'm inclined to vote for it.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Melanie? 
MS. McWILLIAMS: My struggle is, for sure, I have to pick this one or we're stuck with the other one. 
MR. MARTIN: I don't think you're stuck with the first one, if you like this one better.
MS. McWILLIAMS: Right, I agree, but my concern is if this one were to be declined the other one   
MR. MARTIN: Technically the question that you started with about two hours ago   
MS. McWILLIAMS: My point is I like this better   
MR. MARTIN: Essentially the other one would need to be vacated, for lack of a better term, at this point. But if this one was not approved, they would still have the approval. 
MS. McWILLIAMS: Okay. That was my question. I like that better. Do I have to say yes or no? 
MR. MARTIN: No, just your thoughts.
MS. McWILLIAMS: That's a way better design.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Joel? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI: I think Dave did a really good job summing up a lot of the positive changes. 
Here's what I'm struggling with, is I think that the Applicant appreciates all of the positive changes to go to 60 units, they reduced the square footage. They can do the nice setback, less visual impact. And they can do that all without a variance. They don't need the height variance. They don't    I mean, and I know we're having, I think, we're kind of creating it, so they're asking for the height so they can market the units so they have premium ceiling heights. I think they can do everything. They could put the    take out all the amenity space, fifth floor or have who can, you know, friends over, do whatever, and that's great, that's positive. But you'll have another variance. That's the only part I'm struggling with, the positive criteria you gave, it's not a black check to say, oh, you know, public health safety and welfare, weigh there in space and now we're going to go up and out. This is an unusual site. And that's for a (c)(1), (c)(2), that's the only part that I'm struggling with. No one's going to argue that it's a superior design. It looks a lot better. It's just I think they can do all this without going up 5 feet and it's going to be just as big of a building, make it a little bit bigger by doing this. That's my only reservation.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Again, Dave's comments, which I thought were spot on, on this tradeoff. You give on something and you take on another. And    but I think there was a good dialogue on it. I think it's a better project. It's better looking, better design. And there was a lot of good things, I think, that came from the process for it. And they worked with the comments that were provided. And that was nice that Susan mentioned the special needs because I think that's overlooked because we're just kind of looking at this site and the other site as, you know, the affordable special needs at another place. It is part of the timeline on this. Again with the variances, there is the struggle with the volume aspect. And, you know, can it be brought down and not needed? But then again, I mean, the argument is that it was previously approved at 58, it's 58 now. So, I mean, all things being even, I think this is a better project. I liked it. I'm inclined to look on it favorably. Does anyone else have any other comments or want to discuss any motion on this?
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: I would like to make a motion to approve it based on just some of the stipulations we've discussed previously, the ability to look at it or understand who's going to be in that space that's on the nonresidential side and some of the other things that we had mentioned as it relates to sight lines.
MS. McWILLIAMS: Did you agree to that? 
MR. TUVEL:  Yes.
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: Yes. Related to the sight lines, they will take a look at that, they take a look at that.
MR. TUVEL: Yes.
I said we would give that to your planner and take a look at that. 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT: There was something else. I don't remember. 
So, yes, based on that, I would recommend that we make a motion to approve. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Thank you. Do we have a second on the motion? 
CHIEF  Van Goor: I'll second.
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Okay. James seconded it. So we have a motion by Jeff to approve the application and James seconded it. Michael, you want to call the roll? If you vote yes, you're voting for approval.
MR. CAFARELLI:  Only those eligible? 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Only those eligible.
MR. CAFARELLI:  MR. SCHEIBNER? 
MR. SCHEIBNER:  Yes.
MR. CAFARELLI:  COUNCILMAN VOIGT? 
COUNCILMAN VOIGT:  Yes. 
MR. CAFARELLI:  VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI? 
VICE CHAIRMAN TORIELLI:  Yes.
MR. CAFARELLI:  CHAIRMAN JOEL? 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Yes.
MR. CAFARELLI:  MS. McWILLIAMS? 
MS. McWILLIAMS:  Yes.
MR. CAFARELLI:  MS. BARTO? 
MS. BARTO:  Yes.
MR. CAFARELLI:  CHIEF Van Goor? 
CHIEF  Van Goor: Yes.
CHAIRMAN JOEL: Application was approved. 
MR. TUVEL: Thank you very much. 
CHAIRMAN JOEL:  Have a good night. Have a Happy Thanksgiving.
MR. TUVEL:  Have a Happy Thanksgiving. 
(Whereupon, this matter is concluded. Time noted 10:11 p.m.) 

Adoption of Minutes: The minutes from October 3, 2017 were adopted as written.

Executive Session – The Board went into Executive Session at 10:15 p.m., returned to open session at 10:30 p.m. and the meeting was adjourned.
     
Michael Cafarelli
      Board Secretary

Date approved: December 4, 2018