12-12-2012 JOINT PZIRC (Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
JOINT PLANNING, ZBA& PLANNING ZONING ISSUES RESOLUTION COMMITTEE
SPECIAL MEETING
DECEMBER 12, 2012
INDEX
Site Plan No. 62-2011 Queensbury Partners, LLC 1.
FWW Permit No. 6-2011 Tax Map No.289.19-1-23 through 35
Area Variance No. 61-2011
THESE ARE NOT OFFICIALLY ADOPTED MINUTES AND ARE SUBJECT TO BOARD AND
STAFF REVISIONS. REVISIONS WILL APPEAR ON THE FOLLOWING MONTHS MINUTES
(IF ANY) AND WILL STATE SUCH APPROVAL OF SAID MINUTES.
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
JOINT PLANNING, ZBA& PLANNING ZONING ISSUES RESOLUTION COMMITTEE
SPECIAL MEETING
DECEMBER 12, 2012
7:00 P.M.
PLANNING BOARD MEMBERS PRESENT
CHRIS HUNSINGER, CHAIRMAN
DONALD KREBS, SECRETARY
PAUL SCHONEWOLF
DONALD KREBS
THOMAS FORD
STEPHEN TRAVER
BRAD MAGOWAN
DAVID DEEB, ALTERNATE
GEORGE FERONE, ALTERNATE
ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS MEMBERS PRESENT
ROY URRICO, SECRETARY
RICHARD GARRAND
JAMES UNDERWOOD
RONALD KUHL
BRIAN CLEMENTS
JOYCE HUNT
PLANNING ZONING ISSUES RESOLUTION COMMITTEE MEMBERS PRESENT
RON MONTESI, WARD TWO COUNCILMAN
JOHN STROUGH, WARD THREE COUNCILMAN
CRAIG BROWN, ZONING ADMINISTRATOR
QUEENSBURY PARTNERS, LLC SEAR TYPE I AGENT(S) MATTHEW FULLER, ESQ.
FMBF OWNER(S) QUEENSBURY PARTNERS, LLC ZONING O-OFFICE LOCATION
PARCELS ALONG BAY ROAD AND BLIND ROCK ROAD PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
APPLICANT PROPOSES A TOTAL OF 42,280 SQ. FT. OF RETAIL SPACE, 14,000 SQUARE
FEET OF OFFICE SPACE DISTRIBUTED BETWEEN TWO BUILDINGS AND DEVELOPMENT
OF 142 APARTMENT UNITS DISTRIBUTED BETWEEN 10 BUILDINGS TO INCLUDE 63
APARTMENT UNITS LOCATED ON THE SECOND AND THIRD FLOORS OF THE
NORTHERN COMMERCIAL STRUCTURE. SITE PLAN REVIEW NO. 62-2011:
MULTIFAMILY AND COMMERCIAL CONSTRUCTION PROPOSED IN THE OFFICE ZONE
REQUIRES SITE PLAN REVIEW. FRESHWATER WETLANDS PERMIT NO. 6-2011: LAND
DISTURBANCE WITHIN 100 FEET OF A REGULATED WETLAND. AREA VARIANCE NO.
61-2011: RELIEF REQUESTED FROM FRONT, RESIDENTIAL, AND TRAVEL CORRIDOR
SETBACK REQUIREMENTS. FURTHER, HEIGHT RELIEF SOUGHT FOR SPECIFIC
BUILDINGS TO BE DETERMINED. LOT SIZE: 34.05 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 289.19-1-23
THROUGH 35 SECTION 179-9
MATT FULLER, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT
MR. STROUGH-Welcome to the Town of Queensbury Special Workshop. The date is
Wednesday, December 12, 2012, 7 p.m. in the Activities room of the Town of Queensbury. This
is part and parcel with the Planning and Zoning Issues Resolution Committee, and it's in
reference to an applicant, Queensbury Partners, as Site Plan 62-2011, and Area Variance 61-
2011, and so I welcome everybody, and the purpose of the meeting is to allow the applicant to
show Site Plan modifications based on the input they heard from the Planning and Zoning Board
members at our last workshop held Wednesday, September 12, 2012. However, I must
reiterate that the opinions expressed here today by the Board members fall along the lines of
what they might prefer to see or be more favorably inclined to consider if such occasions do
occur, and I would caution the members of both Boards to avoid more definitive statements such
as I or we would approve or I or we would accept and the like. Those kinds of statements would
be inappropriate. What we wish to avoid here is to give the applicant the opinion that merely
following the suggested inclinations means guaranteed approval. The offerings by Board
members tonight do not negate their right to leave the door open to further discussion, that these
and other components remain reviewable, and what the structure of tonight's meeting will be,
I'm going to now hand the meeting over to the applicant's agent, Matt Fuller. He will explain
past and present, and put his best foot forward I'm sure. So he'll show us the update of what
they're proposing, and then I will allow any input from any of the Zoning or Planning Board
members, and thank you for attending as well, and then once we seem to be finished with that
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
discussion, that pretty much concludes the meeting. Okay. So with that. Yes, there won't be
any public input because this is a workshop. Public input will be at the more formal Planning
and Zoning Board meetings that will be forthcoming. Okay. So thank you. Welcome, Matt
Fuller.
MR. FULLER-All right. Thank you, Mr. Strough, Mr. Montesi, for keeping this dialogue going,
and both Boards, certainly, for what is a different kind of process but a good process. Last time
we were here, I won't go right back to the beginning of the plans and things that we've gone
through, but we had some good discussions, and a lot of feedback. We have since worked with
Mike Ingersol and Michael Card from the LA Group, and dealing with, you know, as Mr. Strough
said, not, you know, kind of setting everything down in stone right now, but trying to come up
with a plan that at least we can submit and try to get back that process going. The big topics
that we talked about, again, not the end of the discussion, but call it the big three, but there were
three big issues. The overall number of variances certainly was an issue. Primary associated
with, just because of the number of them, the density, keeping that at 142 units, as per the
zoning, which Craig had issued a determination a while ago on the number of allowed units that
would be permitted, based on the commercial square footage, etc, backing out wetlands, slopes,
things like that, and the other thing we talked about was the height, keeping the height within the
zoning limit, and the other was the 75 foot setback from Bay Road. I won't say their final
opinion, not final, but kind of the direction to us seemed to be sticking more with, you know, what
has gone on down Bay Road, in trying to stick to that 75 foot setback, at least as it pertains to
Bay Road. So we've gone back, took us a couple of months, a lot of plans, a lot of back and
forth, meetings, discussions. What we got tonight, I'm going to slowly, here, turn it over to Mike
Ingersol, and then I'll follow up with a couple of things. We've got a bunch of slides. I did submit
plans. So you'll see the plans that I did submit in that, showing where we are, the couple of
variances that remain, and then we'll walk through a bit of imaging. So we'll actually be able to
take perspective, and even the Boards can kind of, if you want to see certain views. With a
projector, it might move a little differently than a it would on a screen, but we can take different
views and look through it, and things like that, but it impressed me when I took a look at it last
week, and if you like it, then we'll have a discussion and questions. I know I have seen the letter
on the sewage and things like that, and, you know, as we've said in the past, there's engineering
to be done. That's a big cost. We're prepared to do that. We just kind of need to have an idea
of what direction we're heading before we head off into that, stormwater, water, sewer, utilities,
things like that, so in due course, the sewage will be dealt with. With that, Mike, do you want to
walk us through.
MIKE INGERSOL
MR. INGERSOL-Sure. One introduction. My name is Mike Ingersol. I'm a partner at the LA
Group. Kind of been working around the area for the last 30 years, and when we came into this,
I guess you never quite know what you're stepping into. So we wanted, we convinced the
applicants to let us take a re-look at things. I know you guys have had quite a bit of water over
the dam in reviewing this, but we felt that there were some design solutions that maybe would
yield a better project. So we spent a lot of time on that. Also Matt told me there would only be a
handful of people here tonight. So I'm not quite sure, it's a little imposing, a little outnumbered,
but certainly.
MR. FULLER-You didn't ask me to define handful.
MR. INGERSOL-So, the plan that's on the screen I think is what, to date, people that have been
involved have seen. This is the project that originally was unfolding, with Blind Rock Road here
and Bay Road here on the corner. So the acreage is the same. It hasn't changed. We know
that we have a significant piece of this that is wetlands. So we have a buffer to deal with. We
have access points that are somewhat limiting and probably feature traffic improvements. The
project does have an improved sewer access, which was put in at the developer's expense, to
date. So what we tried to look at was all these things that we came up to speed on. One of the
things we're trying to do with a lot of projects these days is really to minimize the vehicular
dominance. So, in other words, parking lots would be secondary to the building placement. So
when the non-project users drive past the project, we try to hide the parking and have it
secondary, not prominent. We try to hide garages and give buildings front doors, which
hopefully you'll see in the new plan, and a couple of other things. Given the prominence of this
site, really cattycorner to Town Hall, this is sort of, and I think it was in your master plan at one
point, the possibility for a hamlet feel or something that's more civic, you know, you guys have
experienced a lot of growth on the corridor, linear growth, but maybe there's a possibility for
some public space in the front yard on the corner. We also try to minimize any wetland buffer
impacts. So I think in this plan there are no structures in the wetland buffers. As Matt
mentioned the 75 foot front yard we've tried to maintain, and one of the, big thing I think you'll
see maybe, if it's not evident, but this plan didn't have much, initially, for pedestrian connectivity
within the plan, sidewalks, linkages from back buildings to the front buildings, linkages along the
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
roadways. So we've tried to take all those buzz words or design tools that maybe if you guys
have been to planning conferences you've heard about, and put that into a new plan, and the
new plan, obviously, it's a concept, at this point, that's pretty defined, but the new plan does
have the density that Matt mentioned, and it is greener. There's more green space and less
pavement, and we'll kind of take you through that. So I hope you'll see the differences of what t
things to come, and I think the next plan you'll see is something that you're going to see more
typically that is a little different. It may not, try to take you through. By bringing the buildings to
the front, to the 75 foot setback, and not encroaching upon that, we are asking, I think, in a
variance that may be on the first floor, you could have a building pediments, the pergola or a
trellis or something like that to break the scale down, but if we put the building along the road
and we focus along Bay Road with public walkways, rain gardens and really a park like setting,
you'll see that the building masks the parking fields to the back. The access is still in the same
places that it was before, but we're able to encapsulate the parking where the general public
doesn't see it. So, Number One, I think that that was a goal we were trying to accomplish.
Number Two, with the housing units before, Matt, maybe you can go back, each of the units, if
you were to go down Blind Rock Road, what you really saw were buildings kind of plunked in
here, but what you saw, as a user, were the garages and the driveway. So we've tried to
reverse that so that now if we offer it as more of a row house feel, similar to the development
across the street, but we don't have a parking lot in the front, when you pull in, you would, again,
have a green belt along the street, and have the parking to the rear. So it's an internal alley
system so the public, again, doesn't see that. You're trying to create a neighborhood with
walkways that come all the way through the front. We've introduced, internally, a walkway that
connects in and around the wetlands, and you could walk from the front to the back. We've
introduced first floor mixed use with apartments above. Now that's a change bringing residential
use to that 300 foot, but that allows us to consolidate some of the mass and reduce some of the
coverages as well. So really what you have here is a plan, like I said, where the front doors are
to the street, the cars are to the rear, the project has an identity. There's the ability for a public,
call it a park, a pocket park, but something that says, when you drive by, that you've arrived to
Queensbury. We'll show you some pictures of that, and it's really a trend in most mixed use
projects where you would put the housing above commercial or office below. Before that was a
little bit happening. It was happening a little, bit, but it really wasn't integrated into the project.
So the way that looks, as we go through this, is you start to create some imagery here. You can
see the building on the corner. We've shown the clock tower. I don't know if that's what we end
up with, but this is now the public identity for the project. The building line is the 75 feet. This
shows, it may look like four stories, I'll show you, but it's really three. One of the other variances
we're asking for is that, instead of a flat roof at the 40 feet, we could put a little decorative roof
that would hide the air conditioner units, the mechanical systems, and give the building some
type of character. So that you'll see this front building when you drive down. You can actually
see how the flat roof would look in the back. Parking and actually the first floor under this middle
building is indoor parking. We found, too, that, we've done a couple of projects, recently in
Saratoga that the tenants want to have a spot inside to park. It's not all just surface parking. So
that's an attractive component. So this unit is strictly mixed use. We have a future phase. We
don't know exactly what that'll be, but that's kind of reserved office commercial, and the rest is
residential. You can see how the row houses would fit, and try to envelope the wetlands and
the drainage and the buffers in the back. So we'll take you through a couple of images. This
would be, this is just one view, again, of Blind Rock, where, on the corner, you would have a
building that wraps and hides, and you don't see any cars. You'd see the ability for landscaping,
people in the front. It's really kind of a town center concept. Again, more at the intersection, just
trying to chill that off. Possibly in front, or towards one side, maybe, if we do, if we're successful,
I can't disclose who, but we've talked to a bistro restaurateur type that might want to have an
outdoor patio for dining that you could put in that area. I think that's allowable, and you could
see what I was talking about, maybe something that brings trellises or something to the building
down to the front plane, and this is how, along Bay Road, even though we have a building line
here, we would be able to landscape and then create, the computer models don't really allow
you to show the topography changes very easy, but those would really be our drainage
recharges and berming and try to create a walkway along the front, and a front door to the public
side of the street. This would be the view along Blind Rock heading towards Town Hall there,
out towards Hiland, but again, same idea, and we'd have to go through all this with the Planning
Board, visually, how many number of trees, the buffering, all those kind of things. The
residential row houses would have, one of the things we've talked about quite a bit is trying to
use indigenous materials, or vocabulary that has local, the feel of the area. So it wouldn't, they
may be modern materials, whether they're vinyl or cement pour, but they would feel like a local
style. So you could have some stone, some trim, or New England style, possibly, that would
have pediments in the second floor, might have balcony entrances, but each of the units would
now have, it may not be the address, literally, to the street, but it would feel like you're driving
through a neighborhood, which tends to slow traffic down. So, what this brings us to, and we're
probably, we have a couple of other tools. We do, at the end here, have the ability, people had
the question, we have a sketch up model that we'll take you through it, you can put yourself
anywhere in the project and see what it looks like. It's kind of a game, but when we got to the
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
end of this, you can see the wetlands and the buffers. Where we ended up is in the back. We
are asking for relief for front yard setback which is 75 feet, which is interesting because that 75
goes along Bay, and the way we read it, it extends all the way down Blind Rock. I'm not sure if
that's really the true intent, but if it is, we would like the ability to not have the road in front. The
alternative would be to put the road in front and move the building back, but we thought the
aesthetic presence of the 25 foot variance would allow the building to be there and the garage to
sit back, and that also keeps the road and a lot of the disturbance out of the wetland buffer. It
certainly can be accomplished otherwise, but we felt that was a better looking way to treat the
street. This shaded area is where that 300 foot transfer of residential to the front office
component of the property happens. The residential's on the second and third floor, but it needs
a variance, or request to do that, and also we'll show you the next diagram in a second, that
talks about the height, and the fifth variance would be if we were allowed to have, right now, as
we read the Ordinance, if you have a portico, a pergola, an extension of the building, even if it's
on the first floor, it protrudes into that zone, so that would require a variance. It's not meant to
increase any building square footage, but to give an architectural treatment within that zone,
because it's part of the structure. Even the eaves of the building, if they're overhangs, that's
something you might want to think about, it tends to create flat buildings at the line. So what
we've been able to do, and this is the height one, but we took those 35 variances to 5, and tried
to create a better setting. This one is really the beginnings of how the architecture might set up.
They wanted to have a base course that had, I don't know if it's stone or brick, but a solid base
with traditional clapboard siding. The building line, right now, of our habitable space, is 36 feet.
Your Ordinance says 40, but in order to get, what we're asking for is permission to build, in
elevation you don't always see it this way, but some type of screening or shed roof that would
shield elevator shafts, chimneys, mechanical systems to the rear. Otherwise you'd have, I
guess it would be allowable to just draw a flat line across the roof, not gaining anymore units or
density, if it's an architectural treatment only, which we think ties the project together. That's
what we came up with. I don't know, Matt, if you want to try to just show, if people have
questions, we could put you into the project and, like I said, get a spot where you want to stand,
we can show you where you'll be. So we could take you around pretty much anywhere you want
to go, if you have those issues and you have a concern.
MR. MAGOWAN-Give us a walking tour.
MR. FULLER-I was just going to say, okay.
MR. INGERSOL-Where do you want to start?
MR. MAGOWAN-Start at the tower.
MR. INGERSOL-At the tower? So which way do you want to go? Do you want to go Blind
Rock, or do you want to go Bay?
MR. MAGOWAN-Let's go down Blind Rock.
MR. INGERSOL-On the ground or above or in the car?
MR. MAGOWAN-No, right on the walking path.
MR. INGERSOL-All right. It's obviously sketchy. It's not finished, but you'd walk past the path
and maybe if there's an outdoor terrace where somebody's having lunch you can go by that.
We don't know if that'll happen.
MR. MAGOWAN-Well, make it winter. Get rid of the leaves.
MR. INGERSOL-But, you know, you get in front of the row houses, one of the things we also
were aware of with the sidewalk, it could be all out on the right of way, but we also realized that
maybe future road expansions or takings. I don't know, and drainage is key for both the road
system and the project. So we wanted (lost word) setback, and these walkways would be the
responsibility of the project, not Town maintained. It's pretty traditional stoop row house feel.
One of the big differences from before is the other units were three story apartments with the
garages. So they made them, they're a little boxier and taller. These are shorter, well within
the height requirements, and they're two story.
MR. MAGOWAN-And is the garage underneath them in the back?
MR. INGERSOL-No. It's at the same grade, to come around to park in the back. Each unit has
its own garage and a parking spot in the parking lot. So, yes, we've actually planned in our
statistics, you know, we can do one and a half per unit, but we've actually planned on two,
because you tend to have visitors or people parking on the street or what not.
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. KUHL-You don't think that by having front door access with a sidewalk that the (lost word)
won't just pull off of Blind Rock and park on the grass?
MR. INGERSOL-We'd have to work with the Planning Board or the Town Highway
Superintendent on that. If it's posted no parking and it's enforced that wouldn't happen.
MR. KUHL-Well, I mean, it's not now, and we don't know what the regulations are, but just from
the standpoint of having people that are renters, you don't think especially when they have
company, a front door is a front door.
MR. INGERSOL-What a lot of towns are doing is widening the street to create parking on the
street to slow traffic down. We can go there, but it's still kind of a through street, not a public
street, but we would have.
MR. KUHL-Which could create danger by having people park on the (lost words).
MR. FULLER-Yes. Well, we don't really see that at Schermerhorn's right now. The similar, I
think that similar threat would pose with Schermerhorn's apartments right across the street, too,
and that really is not a big people parking out on that road there.
MR. INGERSOL-You would also have shared parking, there's an excess in overflow parking
built into this. So, granted, somebody could stop and try to find the house, but a responsible
tenant would say, hey, look, you've got to put your car over on (lost words). There's a
difference. I mean, if the vision is to have a hamlet or a pass through, that's something we need
to know.
MR. MAGOWAN-Well, you're going to take that berm out right down Blind Rock.
MR. INGERSOL-We were thinking that it would be, and it's not showing here, but you would
actually undulate that because you could actually infiltrate stormwater in there also. So you
wouldn't maybe it's not as high of a berm to block it, but it would be enough to roll it, undulate.
MR. MAGOWAN-But that would deter other people, you know, pulling off from that part.
MR. INGERSOL-You'd have to walk across the strip. That's why we pulled, we didn't have a
connection to the street. If you had the sidewalk next to the road, you would probably
encourage more of that.
DAN GALUSHA
MR. GALUSHA-You could do that there, though. I mean, if that's a concern, you could build a
small berm, which would deter, you put a no parking along there and enforce it, Number One.
Number Two, you could do some sort of a raised, not a berm, if you will, but a raised area so it's
difficult to do that.
MR. INGERSOL-We didn't want to fence it in so you don't come here.
MR. FORD-How close is that sidewalk to the road at its closest point?
MR. INGERSOL-Well, we have 50 feet the building closest, so.
MR. GALUSHA-Twenty-two feet.
MR. I NGERSOL-Twenty-two.
MR. MAGOWAN-Could you give me a visual, front look again on those buildings from the road.
All right. Now can we run around back where the parking is and the garages. It looks like two
front doors.
MR. GALUSHA-Yes.
MR. INGERSOL-Yes, what happens is, you know, it's probably like a lot of suburban houses.
People tend to use their garage door to get in their house (lost words) use the front door, but
that's today, and if you wanted to go take a walk, you go out the front door and walk around. I
mean, I, we're trying to, we maybe ahead of the curve, here. I don't know, down the road, what
happens on this intersection, but if it has that hamlet feel, you'd want a front door, versus pulling
in and off the street and seeing the garages and the back of the cars. That would be the
alternative.
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. GALUSHA-I think one thing you might have there, too, along Blind Rock, Mike, is you'll end
up with a swale of some sort.
MR. I N G E RSOL-Absolutely.
MR. GALUSHA-Along the edge of the road, so people don't typically, you could design it so
they'd have to pull down into a ditch. I'm not so sure anybody's going to do that.
MR. MAGOWAN-1 don't see people just parking to run in there and say I don't, you know, like I
said, with the planning and everything else, you know, it doesn't look like, and there's not, the
shoulder's not big enough for a, you know, like if you had enough room to park a car there, then,
you know, you would, but it's pretty, what, it's about a foot and then it's a four inch drop off.
MR. GALUSHA-You could design a swale along there which would carry the stormwater off the
road, which would deter anyone from going in there.
MR. INGERSOL-We were talking about, actually, a series of rain gardens, that (lost words)
wash both the road stormwater and ours.
MR. MAGOWAN-And really the closest one is really on that first building, and you actually could
bring that maybe in a little.
MR. INGERSOL-The walkway.
MR. MAGOWAN-The walkway.
MR. INGERSOL-Absolutely. This is illustrative. Yes, you could bring it, say, we could add
another 10 feet to that, be 10 feet off the building.
MR. MAGOWAN-Yes, because I look at the plows coming down in the wintertime are going to
dump all the heavy snow on that walkway.
MR. INGERSOL-Could be, yes.
MR. MAGOWAN-And you're going to have someone come blow it back out on the road again,
because they don't want it in their front yard.
MR. GALUSHA-We just didn't want it to be a straight line.
MR. INGERSOL-It swoops out pretty good where you could definitely.
MR. GALUSHA-But we just wanted to try to have a meandering, not trying to do it straight lines,
if you will, give it a little character.
MR. MAGOWAN-And I like that. It's a nice look. It's soft.
MR. GALUSHA-We could give it character 10 feet in, closer to the building, if you wish.
BOB MANZ
MR. MANZ-As Mike said to begin with, you know, Option B was flip the two and put the row, in
front of, the row houses and pull the houses, you know, the apartments back, and that just, that
really doesn't create the feel that you want.
MR. FULLER-It's actually discouraged.
MR. MANZ-If you're trying to develop a hamlet type feel to it, you know, you want the road and
the parking in the back, rather than going in front of these apartments.
MR. INGERSOL-We haven't obviously gotten to how you would landscape these four (lost
words) to the building, either, but they could be contained and be little gardens.
MR. FULLER-We hadn't gotten that far in the review, but the zoning and comp plan actually kind
of discourage, or encourage the flip that we've done along the corridor (lost words). Along the
corridor, it's preferred not to have parking in roads.
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. INGERSOL-And again, we were trying to, there's a little bit of the road that comes into that
75 foot wetland setback, which the previous project was right up against it. We were trying to,
there's still a couple, number of the variances (lost words) request, but there's no structure.
MR. MAGOWAN-Well, keep walking.
MR. INGERSOL-Well, there's 142, or is it 144, total. So they're kind of split between the front
building and the back. It's two different types of units, obviously. You can go inside the
building. (Lost words) the walls, but.
MR. FORD-It's interesting, we've taken a step toward a discussion that we've had a number of
months ago relative to underground parking. Here you've got under building parking as
opposed to what we had before.
MR. FULLER-Got as close to Gretchen's desire as we possibly could.
MR. FORD-I just wanted to follow up on that.
MR. FULLER-I actually saw her a couple of weeks ago and I said, we paid attention.
MR. GALUSHA-Yes. There is (lost words), you could still have the fagade feel like it's there.
MR. FORD-It also raises the buildings.
MR. GALUSHA-Well, or we lose square footage on the first floor, yes.
MR. BROWN-So, Matt, those front yard setbacks you talk about along Bay Road, those are just,
that little arbor we saw in the last few, is that the little bits that stick out?
MR. FULLER-Yes. I mean, when we get to planning, if it's something they don't like, then we'll
(lost words).
MR. BROWN-So it's not the mass of the buildings, just the canopy over an opening or a little
arbor or something like that?
MR. GALUSHA-Yes, it breaks the height, if you will.
MR. BROWN-Okay.
MR. INGERSOL-Yes. If you had a, what isn't shown well here is in between each of the
buildings there's actually a corridor or passageway to the back. So what you want would be
some type of canopy that extends, and even if it extends a foot, it's into that, but it's not, we try
to keep those extensions below the first, the second floor. Now in a lot of areas maybe these
balconies should extend out a little architecturally, but we didn't.
MR. MANZ-They create a heck of a lot of character to a flat line, is what they do, and that's the
reason why we specifically put these in here, to add, you know, really discussing the fact that
they would be encroaching on that 75 foot setback. Otherwise, you take them all away and
have a flat building. The character of the building is changed dramatically by just these little
pergolas.
MR. GALUSHA-You can see here what I was talking about with the roof. We're not really taking
the whole mass, but this allows us, if we can get something that shows dormers, but one of the
things you'll see on flat buildings all around, if you start looking at it, mechanical systems.
MR. INGERSOL-When you look at that front there, just the way it is, one of the things that some
of the members wanted was the building shoved out towards the road to try to fill in that gap,
which, you know, it's come down to we need to maintain that 75 foot. So what we tried to do
was infill between the building and the road with something to give it a little bit more of a village
flavor, if you will, and not just open space feel like. So, I mean, that was part of what we were
trying to do in our concept.
MR. GALUSHA-We weren't sure whether even retractable awnings and what not required
variances, but I would think in order to get some interest here, too, some of the tenants may
want color or change. That's kind of a design piece that's really hard to figure out right now.
MR. FORD-One of the things you mentioned before that you're not showing on here would be
the mechanicals. The back of that would, in essence, become the fagade.
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. GALUSHA-It's like a parapet. It's almost like a mansard that hides, but that's about 10 to
12 feet because of the mass and the pitch and the depth, the width of the building.
MR. FORD-Would you point to where you anticipate the mechanical is.
MR. INGERSOL-See this flat piece of the roof in the back, not in the front, or, this may end up,
whether it's got a shed on the back or this is strictly a single (lost word).
MR. FORD-The view would be shielded by that.
MR. INGERSOL-That's right.
MR. MAGOWAN-Those three roofs there, you wouldn't want to put it over on the flat side, on the
front part over there. You'd tuck them all over.
MR. INGERSOL-Here the only place you'd see it would be from the back, and you'd have to get
up high enough, far enough away, to see it, and that, also the way your Ordinance is, it also
precludes even a tall parapet wall or a screen. You'd have to get a variance for that regardless,
because it measures to the highest point.
MR. MAGOWAN-Now what did you say about possibly a balcony up there?
MR. INGERSOL-Well, we didn't show, you can't see here, but we made them straight across. It
would be nice if this had an arch or bumped out a foot or two. So I guess it's really a (lost
words) front zone for a variance. It's hard to quantify each individual piece until the building's
designed, but if you had the ability to prescribe a percentage or certain accoutrements that could
encroach, then the architects could, you know, you could go to work on making that a little nicer.
Even the eaves, the depth of the eaves affects that, too.
MR. MAGOWAN-So what is that, is it 75 feet to the building, or to the first thing that sticks out?
MR. BROWN-Anything that's part of the building, like those arbors or entry covers, those are
part of the building. That has to meet the 75 foot setback.
MR. GALUSHA-So the eaves of the roof, an alternative would be to push them back.
MR. BROWN-Well, the eaves of the roof, the Code allows up to, I think, 18 inches. So if you
have a larger overhang than that, then you're going to have to do some math, but usually 18
inches works pretty much anywhere.
MR. FORD-Those lights on the side of the building, how far do they come off the building?
MR. FULLER-We didn't to connect after that, but I went and looked at that after we met last
week and found that there. So the lights and those things are generally, you get within that 18
inches.
MR. MANZ-Yes, we don't count the lights.
MR. INGERSOL-One thing that isn't shown here that we want to work out eventually is probably
architecturally having a sign band. Signage would be something that's a little different on a
building like this, but traditionally to have a band and the lettering and everything would be
limited along the fagade.
MR. SIPP-In relation to stormwater, what provisions are you thinking about for these sloped,
pitched roofs?
MR. INGERSOL-This entire, and that's one thing that isn't, no gutters. There may be in the
valleys. These are actually probably depressions that infiltrate. We do have the benefit of some
good sandy soil for infiltration for a while. We've also talked about permeable pavement in the
back.
MR. SIPP-How about this pervious pavement?
MR. INGERSOL-That's what I just mentioned, yes, permeable pavement. We wouldn't
necessarily do it on the main road, but in the parking. Because that takes care of our water
quality treatment, and actually we left a lot of area. We'll have a grass strip, and one of the
reasons we wanted to move the road, the things out of that wetland buffer, your wetland buffer,
was that we have that, but every time we get close to the wetland, it presents other issues.
They're wet for a reason.
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. GALUSHA-That's part of why we tried to keep this out into the good, usable land if you will.
Because the closer we keep it up this way, the further away from the wetland. So you're kind of
wedged in here to a certain degree.
MR. INGERSOL-I would envision, you know, even though that roof, if this front half of the roof
and what falls would be treated in here, and the back would have to be taken into either
chambers or subsurface.
MR. MONTESI-Craig, I have a question. When you drive in the driveway and you turn to the
right to get to the commercial buildings, how will you identify that? I mean, how does a person
know where to go?
MR. INGERSOL-Down here or up here?
MR. MONTESI-Yes.
MR. MANZ-That plan, I think, is the sign, the signage that Mike was talking about on the
building. If that's what you're asking, like how do you know where X, Y, Z is.
MR. INGERSOL-Or what we could do. We try to introduce a little masonry walls. You could
bring it up to a, like a pylon directional sign that says, you know.
MR. MONTESI-Well, I mean, what are they going to be allowed? For instance, I rent the bottom
space. I'm on Bay Road. I'm on a parking lot. Where will I be allowed, as an individual renter,
to put a sign?
MR. BROWN-Well, I guess the answer to that's a hybrid answer. Some of it's up to the
landlord, and what the Town Code allows for is each tenant to have, and this would be
considered a business complex because there's more than three businesses there, or there
hopefully will be if this goes through, but each tenant can have a wall sign, and the plaza, a
complex could have a freestanding sign with all of the businesses on there.
MR. MONTESI-Okay.
MR. BROWN-And then there's virtually, I don't want to say unlimited, but there's a fair amount of
on-site directional signage you could have, even to the point of pylon signs within the
development, if you can't see them from off the road or from a different property. We don't, the
Town Code doesn't look at those as signs. So they could be a five by five square foot sign. If
you can't see it from any place off site, we don't regulate those. It's all on-site.
MR. MONTESI-That's what I was getting at, what the Town's regulations.
MR. GALUSHA-We were envisioning somewhat of a stone based pylon with almost a directory
above it, but not, nothing massive, and then you would be directed to an address, and then there
would be a directory on the back that would tell you where to go. So it is a change. It's not
driving by and seeing that logo. You'd have to be used to doing it, but I don't know if all these
are destination necessarily to compete with what's down the road as much, but it's sort of like a
couple of years ago the Adirondack Trust sign that's out front, that was one of our projects. It's
kind of low key, has a stone and has a sign. We envision that as a pylon sign that directs you
into the project. Then once you get in the project, you'd have a building mounted sign or a
number or an address.
MR. SCHONEWOLF-Because some of the people will walk there.
MR. GALUSHA-You've got to slow down, too, but that's a good question. Just a detail that we
don't.
MR. FORD-(Lost words) as been mentioned before, are these measurements taken on the basis
of the current roadway?
MR. GALUSHA-What's shown is the current. We understand that there might be a turn lane
that's part of the project, we just didn't show it that way.
MR. FORD-Blind Rock Road, Bay Road, all as is?
MR. FULLER-Yes, we caught that when we were working through it.
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. GALUSHA-But the setback isn't impacted by that because it's still property line, it's not the
edge of pavement. So that widening would happen within the roadway right of way.
MR. FULLER-The turn lane on Blind Rock, it'll be on there, and again, we will be talking with the
County. We haven't gotten that far yet. All that preliminary engineering has been done on that.
The numbers came back very favorable, like we talked about before. The original report was
that you didn't need a turning lane, but we know that that's been a contentious issue and we
won't venture down that path.
MR. MAGOWAN-Any comments on that side of the room?
MR. UNDERWOOD-The only thing I would bring up is that I'm not sure where you're at with your
engineering or what your prognostications are for that, but one of the things that I thought of was
that the central Queensbury Quaker Road sewer district, you know, this is a part of that with the
Bay Road corridor there, and I know that at the time that it was designed, you know, it was
relative to the fact that the soils weren't suitable for on-site, and that you guys are planning on
hooking up to the sewer and all that, too, but at the time the design was done by Tom Nace, the
Baybridge and some of the townhouses further down the way there were having failures within
their septic systems. The design was done so that it was done under the old guidelines where
we had 1,000 foot setbacks for the residential, and now we're at a point where we have 300 foot
setbacks, and I think that maybe you guys should take a hard look at the parameters that were
developed within there, and, you know, one of the questions I came up with was that they looked
at anticipating flows from future extensions, for BRB Property as it was listed in the book there.
They only listed 22 units that they could accommodate. So what I was wondering is I think it's
only an eight inch main that comes all the way down the road there, and one of the questions
might be, if we do this, is it going to be overcapacity for what the line can, frankly, you know,
pump through at any given time? It's a gravity feed line up here. It's a very low slope line. As
you go down Bay Road it's almost dead flat. I think it's something in the neighborhood of about
three quarters of one percent. So it's like three feet per, three inches of drop per 100 feet along
the line there, and not so much in line with thinking this, but the Town may want to look into this,
too, because if this project goes through, you know, in the way, shape, and form that it's being
presented here tonight, I think that, because we have the 300 foot setbacks, we can anticipate
maybe the Cedars doubling their space. Since this report was done, I know that Surrey Fields
had to hook up, and that took away some of the capacity that they had anticipated adding, you
know, to accommodate within the pipe line there, but I don't want to see us get into a situation
where, you know, maybe this one gets approved and you guys get to do this, and then we find
that everybody else has to go back to that 1,000 foot setback because we can't accommodate
the sewer flows that might occur as we go into it, but, I mean, rather than just simply dismiss it or
anything like that, it's something that we should probably take a real hard look at, and so we
don't, you know, have you guys go through all this work and effort, you know, and then just find
that it's not going to work with the numbers.
MR. FULLER-Yes. We have a follow up report that was done when we designed, Bob and Dan
put the line in, and that was before the Town, the Town Hall and Surrey Fields were allowed to
connect to that, that did address the Bay Road with their development, too. We didn't, actually, I
think we did submit it in the first round.
MR. GALUSHA-C.T. Male has done it. They designed, for us, the sewer line up to here, which
encompassed all of the properties, all types of flows. So all those, this project has a capacity,
and the projects up the street, to go into this line. There's a report from C.T. Male, because C.T.
Male did it. Actually the Town has a copy. I didn't bring it tonight, but we have a copy, but
those things were done, were done when we put the sewer in. That was part of what we did.
MR. INGERSOL-And this proposal's 30 units less than when you did that.
MR. GALUSHA-That is correct. Yes, we have less units here than what we proposed in that
report. So we're going to have less flows than what we originally designed it for.
MR. MONTESI-From the perspective of the Town, probably one of the, and we'll call it a choke
point, will be the Willowbrook pump station that goes from the Schermerhorn development to
Meadowbrook Road pump station, and we're already, the Town is already looking at that in
terms of future capacity and what we may have to do, as a Town, with that pump station.
MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, because that's a force main on that side.
MR. MONTESI-Yes.
MR. UNDERWOOD-It's a different system.
(Queensbury Plan ning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. GALUSHA-And we did up the size of the line coming up the road to take in some of that
capacity. I think we've got an eight inch line. I can't remember. It's probably six, seven, eight
years ago we put that line in, but I've got all the stuff on it.
MR. FULLER-Yes, I have it, too.
MR. GALUSHA-So that should not be an issue.
MR. FULLER-But I've already done it.
MR. KUHL-Well, what is your height with your design now?
MR. INGERSOL-Fifty-two, we think, to the ridge.
MR. KUHL-You have thirty to the third level, right?
MR. INGERSOL-Thirty-six. We think it's thirty-six to the top.
MR. KUHL-It's 36, and where are we at, Craig, 40?
MR. BROWN-Forty is the requirement.
MR. KUHL-So you could do a dummy out roof four foot, instead of the, what do you have,
eleven, twelve now? If you just want to hide your environmentals, you could keep it in to four,
couldn't you?
MR. INGERSOL-It would be a flat roof.
MR. MANZ-But you could, yes, to answer your question.
MR. KUHL-I mean, if you did the same design and just went up four foot, you wouldn't have the
bird cages or the domes, whatever you want to call them.
MR. MANZ-It would still look pretty flat. I mean, that's a big pitch.
MR. GALUSHA-You're trying to do the height to get the pitch. You're basically putting up a
front (lost word) is what you're doing. That's really what it is. It's visual. It's to make it look
proportionally correct, if you will, but to answer your question directly, you could do that. I'm not
so sure the aesthetics would be what you would want, but.
MR. INGERSOL-Immediately, because these will have an elevator, the elevator's going to
protrude 10 feet above the roofline. So you're going to have taller things.
MR. FULLER-And where you're heading is the minimum variance necessary, I presume, and we
can show you what that would look like.
MR. GALUSHA-And some of this comes from, if you look at the old drawings, I forget her name
from the historical, brought us in that old, from the old farm that was there, the old big barns, you
know, some of the thoughts that we had.
MR. INGERSOL-And, just, when you look at elevations of a building, you really, unless you're
quite a ways back, you're not going to see the full roof anyway.
MR. GALUSHA-It's aesthetics.
MR. FULLER-That's a good point. How far back from the edge of the building.
MR. INGERSOL-(lost word) you would have to be 20 feet tall at this elevation, but most other
municipalities measure the height to the midpoint of the roof, not the ridge, but that's somewhat
unique.
MR. FULLER-This is back in front of the building (lost words) that would be an interesting thing
to know. That would give you a perspective on how far back you get from that setback before
you reach maximum height.
MR. INGERSOL-We could do some sections through the, what we think the (lost words).
MR. KUHL-I just anticipate some public opposition because of the height, that's all.
11
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. UNDERWOOD-The other thing to consider is, as Rich was just saying to me, with the roof
pitched to dump all your snow down on the front there, like if you had a metal roof you would
probably get rid of the snow, as soon as it fell, it would slide off, but if you have an asphalt roof
up there, you may have snow build up and then have it careen down on people trying to go in
their (lost).
MR. INGERSOL-There would definitely be snow guards.
MR. GALUSHA-And understand it's not a full line roof, if you will. It's more of a front. The roof is
actually flat behind it.
MR. INGERSOL-Yes, if we were to do the whole roof, it would actually be about this tall.
MR. GALUSHA-Right. So it's kind of a half roof, if you will, or a quarter roof.
MR. INGERSOL-But maybe the pitch could be slightly (lost word). The concept is going to go
above.
MR. MONTESI-Is that what we're talking about, we went from 37 variances to 5?
MR. FULLER-Actually, what I did is, I didn't have it when I submitted. I was actually just
preparing my notes this afternoon, and I took, Craig had, or Keith had done the Staff Notes a
while back last year and really listed out with a chart with the variances, and I went through and
just marked that up and put in, the buildings have been reduced. There's two gone, but the
yellow, and I'll pass these out, you guys can have them. The red is the variances we've gotten
rid of, and the yellow, there's four remaining and one new one. It's just a re-number on the
building. So I can pass those out to you, too.
MR. MONTESI-Well, you know, the reason why John and I tried to pull together the Planning
Board and the Zoning Board for these kinds of meetings was that, when you presented 37
variances, I guess the Planning Board said, well, send it over to the Zoning Board. The Zoning
Board said, too many. It bounced back to the Planning Board, and you guys were sort of in
never never land there for a while, and then John and I said it's time for maybe for us to draw
together both Boards and see what kind of, you know, plans we could make that would be more
acceptable to both Boards, and a better design for the Town, and so I guess you've done the
due diligence on the variances, and now it's a matter of, do we like what we're seeing to have
you proceed on.
MR. GALUSHA-Right. I mean, what we did is kind of followed the path that we believe the Town
wanted, and ran into some variance issues and so on. So we've tried to take everything from
the Zoning Board, the Planning Board, the Town Board, and everybody else's input into this
project. Can I make everything 100% for everybody? Probably not, but what we tried to do, in
this round, was to try to hit all those things that everybody liked here. I can't give the Planning
Board everything they'd like, or the Town Board or the Zoning Board, but we tried to hit all those
things as best we could, and tried to get the vision of a Town having their town center, if you will.
That was our goal, and that's what we tried to do.
MR. KUHL-I just have a question for Ron and John. Seeing as how you sat and you met with
them, is this what you discussed, and are they meeting the criteria that you set up in that
meeting?
MR. STROUGH-Well, I don't think it was so much my criteria as it was, from what I was hearing
from all angles. I mean, from the Board people and the folks and the community folks, with the
three things that Matt had mentioned in the beginning. I said, those seem to be the
predominant, prevailing issues. If you could mitigate those, I think the Boards would be
favorably inclined to go ahead with the project. So, by the tone of the questions and the tone of
the body language, it seems like the applicant is headed in the right direction here. I mean, from
here, when you're finished with the questions, it's going to go through the formal process,
Planning Board to Zoning Board back to Planning Board, Craig, and so, you know.
MR. MONTESI-With more public input.
MR. STROUGH-Yes, and there'll be public hearings and public inputs, and you may have other
criteria that you wish to impose or work out with the applicant, but I think at this stage, we're
certainly in better shape to view the project, in my opinion, than we were before with the 30
some odd variances. Of course, you know, it's entirely up to you. You're an independent Board,
and what happens from here is entirely up to you and the Planning Board and the Zoning Board.
I just think that this process just got a little bit closer to being something that you would favorably
be inclined to consider. So, are there any further questions, though, of the applicant and the
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
project? Because if there isn't, we'll conclude tonight's meeting. I want to thank everybody for
coming. Is there anything the applicant would like?
MR. GARRAND-I would like to request from members of the Town Board. Some information
was presented to us by a member of the public tonight. Can you have our Town Engineer look
at the?
MR. STROUGH-I'm already on that, Rick. I already got wind that this was going to be an issue,
and it's an issue that should be addressed.
MR. GARRAND-We don't want the taxpayers subsidizing private projects.
MR. STROUGH-That's right. I've already e-mailed Mike Shaw, and we're going to bring out the
map plan and reports and review those to make sure that the project goes in, that everything's
going to be okay, and if it's not okay, what can we do to fix it or what.
MR. UNDERWOOD-Should we also not consider everybody else decides to expand the
residential out? I think we should look at the total build out possibilities, because if the sewer
does have a limited ability to handle it, we don't want to have to push them into having to go to a
bigger pipe out there and spend X million dollars to bring it up to accommodate everybody.
MR. STROUGH-Yes. Jim, in fact, I did ask Mike that that's what I would like him to look at, and
so he's supposed to meet with me tomorrow or the next day, and we'll see what happens. He's
going to pull the map plan and reports.
MR. UNDERWOOD-Are you going to have the Town Engineer review it also? I mean, to ensure
that we have a, I mean, Tom Nace might not be a bad one to even contact because he was the
one that designed that system. He could probably tell you in five seconds whether or not it was
going to work for X number more gallons or whatever we're anticipating.
MR. MONTESI-The interesting thing is that, you know, when we talk about more residential
units on, you know, if and when Valente is approved, that will pretty much cap that parcel of
land. Between Valente and let's say Lowe's, that's pretty much a wetland that's not going to get
developed. As you go north from Valente, I'm not sure there's a lot of land left there to be
developed. I know there's a horse farm up there that potentially someday could be developed,
but when we start looking at residential units, we're starting to maximize the use of the land
that's there, and I'm not saying that you couldn't.
MR. UNDERWOOD-No, I'm just saying I remember when we did the Cedars, when we did that,
they're on their own septic which is over towards Country Club Road, up in the northwest corner
of their property there, and I'm not sure if that's something that, you know, we should check to
make sure that that's viable, because I know if they wanted to double the size of their
development, the extra 700 feet closer to the road, they could possibly want to build another
one, and then I don't think they'd have the onsite, you know, disposal available to them to do
that. So we might want to just factor that in, just to make sure we're going to accommodate all
the possibilities.
MR. FULLER-To answer Jim's question, we did, and that report, again, my clients built that line,
it included Surrey Field, Cedar, the Town, Schermerhorn's, even, he's on septic.
MR. MONTESI-The Cedars did kind of a map plan and report and the cost was too high for them
to join. So I'm not sure where they are with that at this point.
MR. UNDERWOOD-No, I was just thinking, because I'm not really sure who's hooked up, who
they anticipated to hook up, you know, like Baybridge apartments, and I don't know if they're on
yet. I think they're still on their own system.
MR. MONTESI-Baybridge?
MR. UNDERWOOD-Baybridge townhouses, but the apartments. I don't know if they're hooked
up yet, are they?
MR. MONTESI-You mean Schermerhorn's?
MR. UNDERWOOD-The other side of Walker.
MR. MONTESI-He's committed to hook up within the year.
MR. STROUGH-Well, three years.
(Queensbury Planning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. MONTESI-Three years, yes.
MR. STROUGH-And to answer your question, Chris Harrington, who's currently in our Water
Department, is going to be taking over water and sewer, and he's an engineer. This is one of
his specialties. I've asked him to take a look at it, with full build out, and everything that was just
mentioned here, because we want to be safe. We want to accommodate this project and we
want to accommodate other growth in the area, if it can, and if there's a bug in the system, we
want to know about that and get it fixed, or at least know about it. Anything else?
MR. MONTESI-Do we feel that we've answered most of the questions? I mean, are ready to
come before the next step to come before the Planning Board and Zoning Board?
MR. BROWN-Yes. Just to kind of outline what the next step would be is, you know, based on
the questions and comments or lack of questions and comments from tonight, the applicants
can go away with some sort of comfort level on what to do next and if they feel comfortable
moving forward with what they've presented based on probably a limited amount of feedback
tonight, you're going to see a variance application, a revised one from the one that they started
with. A formal site plan submittal to the Planning Board and we'll start that process and public
hearings and SEAR Lead Agency designations and all that kind of stuff, and so that's probably
going to take place probably after the first of the year, I would guess.
MR. FULLER-Yes.
MR. MAGOWAN-Do you guys feel comfortable with the plan?
MR. FULLER-Well, I think John, I'll go back to his opening comments, did a good job last time
and it's spot on here. You can't really say yes. You can say no. If there's things that you don't
like that just flat out don't work for you, that you can say. That's, a no is not a yes. So if
somebody just feels that strongly that there's parts here that we really need to, that, you know
what, that's just not going to work, we can hear that, and we did last time. That's how we got to
where we went, but Craig laid out the process. That's how, you know, we come back in, get the
design going and apply for the variances and SEAR.
MR. KREBS-From my perspective, it sounds like you've listened to what both Boards have said
and come up with a new plan. I really like the plan, and I'm not saying I'm going to approve it or
not approve it, but where you've taken the garages away from Country Club Road, because that
was one of the complaints of the neighbors across the way, was that they didn't like the vision
looking across the street. So you have applied changes that seem to help.
MR. GALUSHA-Yes, and we stuck the buildings out front along Bay Road. Actually, John was
the one that brought that up to me one night. Can you hide this. It's that process that does
work, as long and painful as it's been. I just want these Boards to know, we've tried to do
everything we can do to get the Town the best project they can have, and it's just been a long,
hard road, and we're just doing our best with the best information we've got. So if there's
something there, we need to know, feel free, please. I mean, we're very willing to do anything
that's reasonable, and I think we've set that forth in everything that we've done.
MR. STROUGH-1 believe you did, too, and thank you.
MR. KREBS-And I think something all the Boards have to think about in the future is that we are
going to have to look at buildings that are higher than 40 feet.
MR. URRICO-Then we have to look at changing the Code.
MR. KREBS-We have to look at changing the Code. I agree with you.
MR. URRICO-Because we still have the current Code to look at.
MR. KREBS-Right. No, no, I agree with you, but I'm just saying, you know, down the road, the
world is just not going to, if you want green buildings, a five story, six story, seven story building
is much more efficient than a one story building, okay, per square foot, both in cost to build and
cost to maintain and cost to heat and cost to light. There are real efficiencies in multiple story
buildings. So, I mean, that's why a colonial costs less than a ranch.
MR. KUHL-One question, just for clarification. Above your commercial buildings, only the first
floor is going to be commercial, the second and third are going to be apartments, is that?
MR. FULLER-Yes.
(Queensbury Plan ning/Zoning/PZIRC Meeting 12/12/2012)
MR. KUHL-I mean, is it possible that that other building down, set is future?
MR. FULLER-But we were thinking that's really not residential, and actually that's a good point.
MR. INGERSOL-I think there's 26 or 28, it would be two stories, but mixed office/commercial.
MR. KUHL-Okay.
MR. GALUSHA-Or it could be, I mean, we looked at it. We don't know what it's going to be in
the future. I mean, there might be some other opportunities that none of us see here today.
don't know.
MR. MANZ-It could be any one of a number of entities that comes in and wants to have that
building for their building, as a commercial entity. We've had a couple in the past that have, you
know, we were very close on one owner looking to come in and basically take that building. So,
think, you know, I think you have to develop the main part of the property first, and that's why
we specifically left that for the future and left it as a commercial building all by itself, to be
developed.
MR. FULLER-Yes. To answer the question, when Mike was going through his comments, it
sounded to me that some residential might be in that southern building. We're using the density
in the northern part of the project.
MR. INGERSOL-Because they're rental, not condo buildings, it makes it really hard to take that
first floor in, so even if you had an office on two floors, in that building with apartments, they
don't quite mix. So it's all first floor, they're two different uses.
MR. MAGOWAN-And we also talked about heights. How tall is the ACC building there, you
know, the new dorms? And you don't know what they do to expand over here into the, you
know, the cornfield, too, in the future, if they ever extend out into a four year college, but also
coming up, you know, Haviland here, where you stand out there in the Highway garage there
and you look up this building, this building looks four stories tall. So on a visual, you know, to try
to hide everything, I'm in favor of a little bit taller roof, seeing a taller roof than seeing, you know,
all the mechanicals up on top, but, you know, if I look at a visual down the road and looking up
and seeing, you know, this building over here, and seeing ACC built out, excuse me, SUNY
Adirondack, you know, but seeing the height of those, at, you know, would that stand out in the
future. That's my opinion.
MR. STROUGH-Yes. What's being proposed across the road is stem complex, science,
technology, engineering, math complex, and the student housing, just for, that's four stories. It's
about 40 feet. If you count the elevator towers and such, it's 44, 45, some place in there, the mid
40's. Just for reference.
MR. MAGOWAN-You're going to see the mechanicals on those things.
MR. STROUGH-Well, you will, there.
MR. MAGOWAN-It's so high, what's going to look better, you know, hiding them or seeing them.
To me it's hiding them is what's.
MR. GALUSHA-You're doing a little bit of a village here, so it's a little different than a strip mall
or something like that. That was our perception of what we were trying to accomplish.
MR. STROUGH-Okay. Well, thank everybody for coming. Thank you very much.
MR. FULLER-We appreciate it.
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