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2007-03-27 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MEETING SECOND REGULAR MEETING MARCH 27, 2007 INDEX Site Plan No. 53-2006 Joseph Leuci Mountainside Auto 1. Tax Map No. 296.9-1-7.2 Site Plan No. 2-2007 The Michaels Group 16. Tax Map No. 296.8-1-8.1 Site Plan No. 3-2007 Vance Cohen 37. Tax Map No. 295.8-1-2 Site Plan No. 9-2007 Katherine Lapham 51. Tax Map No. 239.16-1-11 Subdivision No. 5-2007 Prospect Child & Family Center 52. SKETCH PLAN Tax Map No. 295.18-1-73 Site Plan No. 8-2007 Stewarts Shops 55. Tax Map No. 303.19-1-61 Site Plan No. 10-2007 Cardiac Realty, LLC 62. Tax Map No. 296.16-1-16.14, 16.15, 16.16 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. 0 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MEETING SECOND REGULAR MEETING MARCH 27, 2007 7:00 P.M. MEMBERS PRESENT CHRIS HUNSINGER, CHAIRMAN TANYA BRUNO STEPHEN TRAVER THOMAS SEGULJIC THOMAS FORD MEMBERS ABSENT GRETCHEN STEFFAN DONALD SIPP EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR-BLANCHE ALTER LAND USE PLANNER-SUSAN BARDEN STENOGRAPHER-SUE HEMIINGWAY OLD BUSINESS: SITE PLAN 53-2006 SEQR TYPE UNLISTED JOSEPH LEUCI MOUNTAIN SIDE AUTO AGENT(S) BARLETT PONTIFF STEWART & RHODES OWNER(S) GUIDO PASSARELLI ZONING HC INTENSIVE LOCATION 1110 NYS ROUTE 9 APPLICANT IS PROPOSING TO ESTABLISH A PUBLIC PARKING FACILITY ON THE PROPERTY IN ADDITION TO THE EXISTING AUTO USE ON THE SITE. PARKING FACILITY USES REQUIRE SITE PLAN REVIEW BY THE PLANNING BOARD. CROSS REFERENCE N.O.A. 6-06, SP 55-98, SP 14-97 WARREN CO. PLANNING 12/13/06 LOT SIZE 5.82 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 296.9-1-7.2 SECTION 179-4-020 STEPHANIE BITTER, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Susan, if you could summarize Staff Notes, please. MRS. BARDEN-The applicant seeks site plan review to establish a public parking facility, in addition to the existing auto use on site. Additionally, a sign promoting public parking and an area for display of four cars in front of the site are also proposed. Staff has concerns including the previously approved landscaping along the northeastern slope was installed but not maintained, including five deciduous trees and 21 evergreens. The Board should consider the appropriateness of granting the waivers requested, including the request to waive a lighting plan, landscaping plan, grading plan and erosion and sediment control plan. The Warren County Planning Board recommended, at their th December 13 meeting, No County Impact with the condition that hours coincide with The Great Escape Theme Park, and local board consider the Comprehensive Plan information in regards to display of cars. A Vision Engineering project review comment letter dated March 20 has been submitted for consideration. This is a SEQRA Unlisted Action. A Short Form was submitted with the application. MR. HUNSINGER-Good evening. MS. BITTER-Good evening. Stephanie Bitter here with Maria and Joe Leuci for the applicant. As Staff just summarized, we’re looking to modify the site plan by incorporating a public parking facility use with this existing site, as well as the proposal of having four display cars along Route 4, and a sign which would identify the public parking facility use to be installed on Route 4 as well. There’s 130 parking spaces at the site. As Staff has indicated, the existing building is 6,048 square feet in size. When you go through the parking calculation, due to the current use being sales and service, it comes out to about 30 spaces that are being used. So about 100 spaces will be utilized by the parking facility use which we can make that notation to the map. The applicant will also be displaying the four cars as we propose, but no changes are being incorporated with that display area. There’ll be right on the lawn that’s already maintained. The sign that’s being proposed will comply with all zoning regulations and the applicant understands that they’ll have to obtain a sign permit in order to install that sign. We can identify the setbacks on the map as Staff has suggested as well. The 1 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) applicant has no issue with maintaining the hours of operation that are already conditioned for the auto sales and service use, as well as the Warren County had recommended that they maintain The Great Escape hours for the parking facility use, which they have no problem with maintaining. It’s a seasonal use which is being proposed for the public parking facility for the purpose of getting Great Escape patrons to the site. With regards to the lighting waiver, we’ve requested it due to the fact that the public parking facility is for Great Escape patrons. It’s going to be seasonal. It’s only going to be utilized during the daytime hours. So we weren’t proposing any changes to th the site, as well as lighting. Dan Ryan’s letter, his last letter was dated March 20. I think that you guys had received a copy of it. He had, the only outstanding issues that he had was with regard to the parking area circulation, and the safety of pedestrians. I had sent him a response today, that I cc’d the Chairman on, which identified the actual dimensions of the parking area, as to the distance between the parking stalls and from the existing building and the edge of pavement, and he was satisfied that there would be circulation as well as emergency vehicle access. In addition, we had suggested that we would place cones on the gravel to direct the pedestrians to the sidewalk, who would be coming in to use the public parking facility use, and he seemed to be accepting to that as well. We had suggested a gravel parking in my letter, I’m sorry, a gravel walkway, which would run alongside the existing asphalt entrance, which the applicant would really like the Board to find out how they felt about that. Because right now there’s a landscaped grassy area that he’d rather maintain, but obviously we would go to the direction of the Board, but Dan overall felt comfortable with those items being incorporated, as well as the septic relocation area he identified as still being a concern, which we said we could do, as well as the fact that we have the sewer to connect to as an alternative, if needed. If the Board had any questions. MR. HUNSINGER-Any questions from the Board? MR. FORD-So that ground contamination, you will include that in the plan, even as a back up plan? MS. BITTER-With regards to the display cars? MR. FORD-No. MS. BITTER-With regards to Item Four for the seepage pit? MR. FORD-Item Four, the seepage pit. MS. BITTER-We were going to show an area of replacement which would be on the northeastern section of the map, closer to, in this area. MR. FORD-And has signage been a consideration for directing pedestrian traffic, as opposed to the cones? MS. BITTER-We hadn’t really considered it, because obviously we were trying to, the applicant doesn’t see it as being a large number of individuals that would be utilizing the site. So they felt that they would be able to maintain and be able to direct the pedestrians with a visual aid as the cones, as well as discussing it with them when they pulled in to the parking lot. MR. FORD-So there will be an outside attendant present during the operation? JOE LEUCI MR. LEUCI-Yes, we’ll be guiding where to park the cars and where to walk to reach the sidewalk. It’s just a short walk from the parking lot to the sidewalk. MR. FORD-I’m concerned about pedestrian safety. There’s going to be someone there giving them verbal direction, and that and the cones, perhaps, could address it. MR. HUNSINGER-Other questions or comments from the Board? MR. SEGULJIC-Is there a sidewalk along Route 9 there? MS. BITTER-Yes, there is. MR. LEUCI-Yes. 2 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-Is it depicted on your drawing? MS. BITTER-No. It’s not on this drawing, but there is one, if we needed to update the map, we could do that. MR. FORD-Well, the map is going to need to be updated anyway. MS. BITTER-Right, anyway. MR. FORD-So let’s get the sidewalk in there. MR. SEGULJIC-I guess overall I’m just confused. So you have an existing car display area. How many spots now? MS. BITTER-The only number of spots (lost word) for that use is 30. MR. SEGULJIC-How many spots do you have now, only 30? MS. BITTER-No. We have 130 parking spots that exist now. MR. SEGULJIC-So this area that’s proposed parking area you’re going to isolate out and make it for the proposed parking. MS. BITTER-Exactly, for the proposed parking. MR. SEGULJIC-So all of the asphalt and everything is there? MS. BITTER-Right. There’ll be no changes to the site. MR. SEGULJIC-But you want to change the use of the site. MS. BITTER-Correct, to add this use. MR. SEGULJIC-And what exactly are we approving, then? MS. BITTER-The public parking facility use, as well as the display cars that would be noted in the front, and then the public parking facility sign. MR. SEGULJIC-So now it becomes a mixed use? I’m confused. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. I mean, they would still have the used cars sales there. MR. SEGULJIC-But that would be limited to 30 spaces. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. SEGULJIC-Now this proposed public parking area, when I count the spaces, I come up with like 80 something, not 100. MS. BITTER-Okay. MR. SEGULJIC-It’s possible I’m incorrect. MS. BITTER-I’m not sure if it’s just that there’s not a number depicted on the northwestern end, that could be the classification, the difference, but only 30 are needed for the actual auto sales and service use. So the remaining spots would be for the parking facility. There’s not a necessary number for the public parking facility, pursuant to the Zoning Code. So that’s kind of where it leaves it open for room. MR. HUNSINGER-Actually that was one of the questions that I had. Since it’s just a gravel, large open gravel lot, you know, you’ve depicted pretty organized parking, but I still see lots of room to fit additional cars in. So the question sort of is begged, when do you stop? How do you determine when it’s really full, and what’s to stop them from parking on the grass or parking other than what’s depicted on the site plan. MS. BITTER-Right. I mean, obviously, we could, if you wanted that limitation, that’s only to the gravel area, but that was only what the applicant had intended. He wasn’t planning on going over, and he wasn’t anticipating it being an excessive use. He wasn’t even anticipating it being the 100 cars that we were originally stating it. I was only 3 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) looking at it in the sense of what exists there today, the number that are necessary for the auto sales and service use with the remaining number being classified for the public parking facility use. MR. HUNSINGER-How often, realistically, would you have the lot, you know, more than half full? I mean, obviously on big weekends. MR. LEUCI-The only time it gets a little bit busy is on the weekends. For the most part, during the weekdays, if 15 cars pull in there, it’s a lot. If 20 cars pull in there, it’s a lot. It’s just such a low effort, so few cars come in there. Do you know what I’m saying? On the weekend, yes, we’ll get a few more cars on a Saturday or Sunday, but never probably more than 40, 50 cars per day. I mean, not that I want to limit it to that, but that’s what it was last season when we had a parking facility going. That’s all the amount of cars that came in there. I’m still the furthest away from Great Escape. I’m still the most, least desirable place to park. A lot of people park in Great Escape first, and they’ll come to me second. I don’t overflow it. I don’t park on the grass. We don’t park anywhere other than where we’re supposed to be parking. I couldn’t fill that parking lot. MRS. BRUNO-Let’s say potentially that your price point becomes considerably lower than The Great Escape’s, we’ve got families traveling from long distances with increased cost of gas. They arrive. They want to park in the least expensive place. We could be looking at an increased number than what you’ve had in the past, and I think that we just need to make sure that all of your concerns, Chairman, you know, are addressed. MR. LEUCI-Okay. First of all, I was the least expensive, okay, and I still didn’t overflow the parking lot ever. Simply because I’m further away. People would rather park closer, pay more, and not have to walk as far. Most of the people that come to me are our own community people that come in to say thank you, you know, we appreciate you giving us a less expensive parking area. It saves us a few dollars. Most of it is for locals around here, honestly, because the tourists that come off Exit 20, they don’t even know what exit it is. They come off. They’re going to Great Escape and the new site. So as far as being a low price and overflowing, I can’t see it happening. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. MR. TRAVER-I had a question about the sidewalk, and you can see from the photograph that’s up there now, coming south from your, I’m sorry, north from your property, there is a sidewalk. Do you happen to know if on the other side of Round Pond Road, and I don’t recall from our site visit, is there a sidewalk there? There is? Okay. So basically people, other than crossing Round Pond Road, will have a sidewalk accessible to them all the way to the entrance to The Great Escape. MR. LEUCI-Exactly. MR. TRAVER-Thank you. MR. FORD-Would the cones that you described before be part of that drive in the picture there on the north side of that drive? MS. BITTER-Right, it would be closer to the actual gravel, the grass area. MR. LEUCI-It would probably be more north. There’s a good opening more north, which is not in that picture. MR. FORD-So you’re going to take them across the grass then? MR. LEUCI-Yes. MARIA LEUCI MRS. LEUCI-Not the driveway. MR. LEUCI-And I’ll be honest with you. If you want me to put cones, I’ll put cones out there, but there’ll be more an eyesore than anything else. Right now there’s nice grass out there. There’s nice landscaping. For the few pedestrians that are going to walk across there, I’ll have an attendant out there. He could simply guide them right through the path. I’ll gladly put cones, but I think it would be more of an eyesore than anything else. 4 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MRS. LEUCI-It’s an easier walk to cut through the trees, the pathway, than to come back to the driveway and walk down. MR. HUNSINGER-I’m sorry. Where’s the path? MR. LEUCI-It’s probably maybe 100 feet north of where you see right there, the entrance. MRS. LEUCI-It’s in where they’re going to be parking. MR. LEUCI-Yes, we do it that way so people don’t have to worry about traffic pulling in or out of the driveway, and pedestrians going in and out of the driveway. It’s like their own separate walkway. MR. FORD-I guess I was confused. I thought you were going to place cones in that drive area. MR. LEUCI-No. There’s a separate small alleyway, maybe 100, 150 feet north of that entrance right there. MRS. BRUNO-Could you actually point that out to us, please, just so that we can be sure that we’re all on the spot? Right about where your topo numbers are? MR. FORD-Does it commence just north of the light pole? MR. LEUCI-Right about that. MRS. LEUCI-A little down more. MR. FORD-A little further north? MRS. LEUCI-Yes, just a little north of that. MRS. BRUNO-Pretty much bisecting the row of existing trees, the nine white pine and fifty-one maple, it looks like. MR. HUNSINGER-How many attendants do you have? MR. LEUCI-One. MR. HUNSINGER-Just one. MR. LEUCI-Like I said, this is not a Great Escape parking facility. This is just an auxiliary facility. People come in 10, 15 cars a day, maybe 20 cars in a day. It’s not a big operation. MR. HUNSINGER-Other questions or comments from the Board? MR. SEGULJIC-Your operations now are limited from 7:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Is that accurate? MS. BITTER-Pursuant to the existing site plan. MR. SEGULJIC-And doesn’t Great Escape operate until 10 o’clock during the summer? MS. BITTER-That’s for the auto sales and service use. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay, but Great Escape operates until 10 o’clock during the summer. MR. LEUCI-I think maybe on a Saturday. I don’t know for sure if it’s every night. MRS. LEUCI-It’s just one night a week. MR. SEGULJIC-Which would be the busiest night. So you could have people parking in this lot, past when you’re closed. MRS. LEUCI-That’s true. MR. LEUCI-It’s possible. 5 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MRS. LEUCI-People don’t usually come at eight o’clock at night to go to an amusement park. They’re already in the facility at that time. MR. FORD-But they’ll be leaving. MR. SEGULJIC-So you’re not going to have any lights for them? MR. LEUCI-I do have. There are lower lights, not the high lights. I do have lower security lights that stay on all night for my own security purposes. So it’s enough lighting in the parking lot for them. MRS. BRUNO-Usually when it comes to any sort of public access to a site, we’re usually pretty rigorous in terms of the lighting requirement for safety, and, you know, you’re talking about a walkway that isn’t going to be of a consistent material. I mean, it will start out that way, and I’m sure you’ll keep it up, but, you know, it’s not a smooth grade, and you’ve just got some, you’ve got a mixed use, which obviously you’re not going to be using the auto sales late at night, but I would be more comfortable if we got a calculation on the lighting to make sure that it. MR. LEUCI-Listen, I have more than ample lighting if I put my outdoor lights on. I could put them on a timer for that one night where Great Escape is open late. The lights I have, I have three, four poles of three heavy duty lights, there you can see them, and I keep the lower lights on for security purposes, which is ample lighting, okay. If you saw it in the nighttime, you’d see it’s ample lighting already, but if you felt more comfortable, on the nights that Great Escape is open until 10 o’clock, I can keep the big lights on until 10 o’clock. Let’s face it, it doesn’t even get dark until 8:30 during the summer hours, but if you need me to keep the bigger lights on on the nights that they’re open late, I’m okay with that. MR. SEGULJIC-But your store is limited until 8:30 at night. How are you going to prevent people from coming in to go car shopping? I’m just very confused with all this. MRS. LEUCI-We can’t prevent them from doing that any time. MR. LEUCI-We can’t do it any time is right. They do it now to begin with. MS. BITTER-There’s obviously not going to be anybody there to help them. MR. SEGULJIC-Have you requested a waiver from the lighting requirements? MS. BITTER-That’s true. MR. SEGULJIC-If you already have lighting, why would you request a waiver? MS. BITTER-For any additional requirements for the additional use. We’re just proposing that the site remain as is, other than adding this additional use. MR. SEGULJIC-I guess my concerns are lighting and the safety issues. We have a lot of people crossing the street there. Why wouldn’t you just stay a car business? MR. FORD-Crossing what street, Tom? MR. SEGULJIC-Across Round Pond Road. MR. HUNSINGER-Is there street lights on that section of Route 9? MR. LEUCI-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-Review with me when the building was initially put up. It seems like it’s been there for about five or seven years now. MR. LEUCI-I think around January 1, 2000. MRS. BRUNO-So seven years. Okay. Not to be a bugger but, then on the flipside, in terms of the amount of lighting that you’re proposing with the larger lights, then you get into the whole dark sky. I mean, it seems like we’re talking, I think I’d feel better if we could acquire some information on the lighting units that you have, so that we could just get a better idea, maybe somehow meet in the middle. We don’t want the sky lit up, but 6 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) on the other hand, we want the safety. We just went through this with a neighbor of yours and The Great Escape. It was quite a dark sky compliant facility. MR. LEUCI-And that’s obviously the reason I don’t put the big lights on too often. Maybe when it gets dark at 4:30 I’ll put them on for an hour or two, until they close up. For the most part, I don’t use the big lights. So it’s not an eyesore. Okay. You’re asking about safety issues. I don’t think it’s necessary to put them on at all. The lot is pretty well lit with the low lights on it. MRS. BRUNO-Do you still have any cut sheet or any information on the lighting fixtures that were used? MR. LEUCI-I don’t know. MR. HUNSINGER-I was going to ask Staff if they did a lighting plan in 2000. MR. LEUCI-All lighting was approved when I did it last time. Whatever the Board asked for, I did it. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, I think we had different lighting standards then, also. MR. LEUCI-I mean, I’m very courteous and compliant to the Town. I had a neighbor who was complaining that one of my big lights was shining too bright in her back yard. I just had a truck come there and direct it down. I’m very courteous to my neighbors and it would be the same in the situation here also, and the short walk you talk about, it’s probably less than 100 feet from the parking lot to the lighted sidewalk, is really insignificant. MRS. BARDEN-I don’t have an old previously approved plan. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. LEUCI-And you keep them on, you’re still only talking about possibly one night a week, the night they’re open late. For all the other nights, they’re closed while it’s still daytime hours. MR. HUNSINGER-So each of those four light poles across the front, they have essentially five fixtures on them? MR. LEUCI-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-And when you said the lower, you mean the two? MR. LEUCI-The two on the bottom are lower security lights. MR. HUNSINGER-How high are those? MR. LEUCI-Height wise? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. LEUCI-Maybe 12 feet high. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay, and then the top ones are probably 20? MR. LEUCI-Yes. So at night I keep the low ones on, just for security purposes. Just an overlay of the parking lot. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Any other questions or comments? MR. SEGULJIC-One last thing. In the notes it says there was, the five deciduous trees and twenty-one pine trees on the northeastern slope are installed but not maintained. MR. LEUCI-I’ve kept them up and maintained them as well as possible. MS. BITTER-Right. I think I was just purposes of, you know, seasonal issues. I don’t know if it was anything that was neglect or anything, but I know that there’s a number of trees that are there. I don’t know, there was only five trees, I guess, that are at issue. 7 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-Yes, because it doesn’t say exactly how many, but some of the trees that were planted are not there anymore. Is this from Bruce? MR. FORD-They weren’t pruned or whatever. MRS. BARDEN-Well, it was really hard to get some pictures, with the snow, of what’s there now, but certainly I didn’t think that this whole area in that corner that was previously approved was intact there. I think there are some trees in that location, but not the. MR. SEGULJIC-2000 approval? MRS. BARDEN-The five deciduous trees and twenty-one evergreens that were approved in ’98. MR. SEGULJIC-So you’re saying they’re not there. MRS. BARDEN-No, they’re not there. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. FORD-So that’s what’s meant by not maintained? MS. BITTER-I think that actually, are we talking about the northeast corner where the addition was? Yes. Those are removed from the most recent map that I submitted. Because of the fact that those were only incorporated when the addition was supposed to go forward, and the addition didn’t happen. That’s the northeastern side. So this map that you have from my most recent submission, they’re not even identified. MR. SEGULJIC-So they were never installed? MS. BITTER-They were never installed. MR. LEUCI-They were never installed because the addition was never, it was only a proposed addition. That was never added on. MRS. BARDEN-But the expansion of the gravel parking area was done. MS. BITTER-The parking area was completed, right. MRS. BARDEN-Some of the site improvements that were approved in ’98 have been completed. The building addition was not constructed. It sounds like the landscaping was not completed. I think the stormwater management plan at that time was completed. MR. LEUCI-And so was all the landscaping completed at that time, or else I would have never gotten a C of O to go into business. Everything was completed. I had completed everything that they asked for, the back banks and the side banks, everything that the Town asked for, I had completed. MR. FORD-Susan, can you amplify just a bit on then what is meant by not maintained? Is it pruning that’s the issue, or what? MRS. BARDEN-We have some ortho photos, and I compared the more historic ortho photos to the more recent, and it appeared that there were some trees in the 2001 photo that were not there when it’s compared to the 2004 ortho photos. So, that lead me to believe that they had been installed at that time, but then they weren’t maintained. They’re no longer there. With your site plan, you have to keep all of your site improvements maintained for the life of your project. MR. FORD-Could the applicant address that same? MS. BITTER-The applicant was saying that he knows that for during that timeframe that NiMo came and took certain trees out for safety purposes because of the utility poles, but other than that, that was the only change, from the landscaping. MR. LEUCI-Yes, and it took a very minor, maybe a couple of three small trees, that’s all it was. 8 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. FORD-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-We do have a public hearing scheduled tonight. Is there anyone here that wanted to address the Board on this application? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. I’ll leave the public hearing open for the time being. This is the southeast corner. That’s why I was confused, because I thought we were talking about the corner near the Route 9. MRS. BARDEN-You’re right. Sorry about that. In the area where the addition was previously. MR. LEUCI-The southeast corner. This is the one we never did the addition. MRS. BARDEN-Sorry about that. MR. HUNSINGER-Isn’t there homes just to the east of the site? MR. LEUCI-No, not quite to the east. They’re more southeast. MR. HUNSINGER-More southeast? MR. LEUCI-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. Because I remember when you were here in 2000, and that was the reason why we wanted those trees put in, was because there were, at the time, some comments from the neighbors about visual impacts, potential visual impacts, I should say. MR. LEUCI-But those trees weren’t part of the original plan. Those trees came into play, if I was going to do the addition, which I never did. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. LEUCI-That’s why we removed it from tonight’s application. You cannot see any houses from my location, nor can they see me from where they are. MR. TRAVER-Were there trees planted at that location? Because it appears in one photograph that there are. MS. BITTER-Can I look at them? MR. TRAVER-Sure. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. FORD-The 2001 photo. MR. TRAVER-Yes, the 2001 photo it appears from that image, the aerial image, that there are saplings there in roughly the pattern indicated on that original site plan, and then in ’04 they appear to be gone. MR. LEUCI-There were some trees in there transplanted. I know a few of them didn’t make it. There’s still some back there, but some of them didn’t make it also. It’s just, you know, a back part of the property that nobody pays attention to, and they just didn’t survive, a couple of them. If you see where they’re located, it’s really so insignificant it’s right next to the wood line. MRS. BRUNO-Susan, do we have a good picture of the area along the Route 9, where they’re proposing to put the walkway, those trees? MRS. BARDEN-I don’t. I didn’t, I would have. I didn’t see that it was part of the plan, so I don’t. MRS. BRUNO-I didn’t look particularly at that mid-section of trees. 9 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-And the snow might have melted enough now that you can see the walkway. MRS. BRUNO-Right. MR. HUNSINGER-It might have. MRS. BRUNO-Is it your determination that those trees, the ones that are listed as the row of existing trees to remain, that they’re all quite healthy? MR. LEUCI-Where, in the front of the property? MRS. BRUNO-Yes, the front of the property. MR. LEUCI-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, what’s the feeling of the Board? MR. FORD-I don’t have any further issues. MR. HUNSINGER-Would you like more information? MR. SEGULJIC-The only concern I would have is the lighting, but overall, I’m not too comfortable with it, but the public isn’t too concerned with it. So it kind of washes away my concerns. On the one hand, the place is probably over lit with those big lights. MR. HUNSINGER-I think it would be, too. MR. SEGULJIC-It gives us a chance to tone those down. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-Yes, and the other lights are also not full cut off, if you look at them. They look like they’re tilted up. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. SEGULJIC-So, speaking for myself, I think the thing to do would be to table it for a lighting plan, for cut off lights, that would be in compliance with our current Code. MRS. BRUNO-I agree. I’m uncomfortable with just having the gravel walkway. I really think that a little bit of effort needs to go into putting something that is a smoother surface that blends in with the landscaping, so that it doesn’t look just plunked, and then, you know, along those lines, Staff had also mentioned something about the signage. I think we need to see that, too, if we’re going to, if we’re going to table it, I think we need to have an idea of what the sign’s going to look like, whether it’s a permanent sign or not. MR. LEUCI-It doesn’t have to be a permanent sign. It’s only a seasonal business. I could put a sign up there just for the season that we’re open. If you feel more comfortable putting gravel, from the parking lot to the sidewalk, I have no problem doing that. I just know it looks prettier right now. It’s more aesthetic right now. MRS. BRUNO-So you’re proposing that not even gravel would go there, then, it was just literally on the grass? MR. LEUCI-I was going to leave it at grass, because it looks a lot prettier than. MRS. BRUNO-I don’t think it’s going to look pretty after people have traipsed over it for a little while. MR. LEUCI-You misconstrue it. You’re thinking that 100 people a day are going to walk over the grass, and that’s not the case. If 15, 20 people walk over the grass a day, that’s a lot, okay. It was the same thing last year. They didn’t destroy the grass, nor anything around it. It was still in perfect condition, okay, and that looks a lot prettier for the other nine months a year when it’s not open as a parking lot, to have a pretty grass façade out there instead of gravel. It’s not like it’s going to be a high traffic parking lot. The few people a day walking over grass is not going to hurt the grass, but if you feel more comfortable with me putting gravel there, I have no problem putting gravel there, but aesthetically it’s not going to look as nice as what I have right now. 10 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MRS. BRUNO-Actually, I wasn’t even proposing gravel. I was proposing more of a solid walkway. MR. LEUCI-Even that. It’s not going to look nice. If you want me to do it, I’ll do it. It’s not going to look nice. Right now it’s a pretty façade. It’s all grass. You have a nice sidewalk. It’s all grass. It’s no big deal. People walk 50, 75 feet through the grass onto the sidewalk, and it’s not a lot of traffic that we’re talking about. You’re talking about 15, 20 people a day. It’s not a lot of people, and as far as the lights, if you’ve seen the place at nighttime, drive by, you’ll see the low lights on. You’ll see it’s adequate lighting, and we’re still talking about one night a week. If you want, I’ll close down. I’ll tell people the parking lot closes at dark, okay, they have to have their vehicles out before dark, for that one night that Great Escape is open. If that makes you feel more comfortable, we can do that also. MR. HUNSINGER-You’d mentioned earlier that there was a new plan. What changes have been made, compared to what we’re looking at? MS. BITTER-The plan that was submitted in March, the problem was that the plan that we originally submitted still had notations from the original approved plan that said certain things like, with regard to the stormwater, to be installed, which were already installed. So those comments were removed because there was confusion with the engineering comments as well as Staff comments. So just to clear things up, we wiped the things that weren’t necessary on the map and made the newest submission. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Well, it seems like we’re leaning towards tabling. What do we want to see for lighting? Just cut sheets? Do we want to see the photo metric? MS. BITTER-Are you looking more at what’s existing? Is that what you’re investigating? MR. SEGULJIC-I would assume, did you have a lighting plan when you got the approval in 2000? MR. HUNSINGER-I don’t think so. MS. BITTER-I don’t believe so. It was whatever was incorporated in this plan. MR. HUNSINGER-The lighting standards that the Town currently has don’t go back that far. They were adopted, I think, in 2003 or ’04. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. LEUCI-It was a lighting plan. I complied to all the planning that they asked at that time, because the issue was they didn’t want it to bright, not too low. I complied to everything they asked at that time. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. No, I’m not saying you didn’t. I’m just saying that the requirements have changed since you were here. That’s what I’m saying. So the kind of information that Mr. Seguljic is asking for we might not have received in 2000 because it really didn’t apply yet. MR. LEUCI-Okay, but why are you asking for lighting? If I close the place at dark, why do we need a lighting plan anything different than what I have now? MR. SEGULJIC-Because there’s nothing stopping you from turning on the lights all night. MR. LEUCI-I don’t need to. I never have. Why would I? MR. SEGULJIC-You’re before us again. We have an opportunity to reduce lighting in the Town. MR. LEUCI-I don’t need to run my expensive lights all night long. I don’t even do it. I keep them on during business hours, in which time, from four to six o’clock, and that’s it. I shut them down. They’re on a timer. I don’t want to run them. They’re expensive to run. There’s no need to run them, and I’m certainly not going to run them just to park cars. It’s fruitless, okay. I’ll close the place down for the evening hours, after dark hours. MR. SEGULJIC-So you’d be willing to take down the floodlights on the top? 11 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. LEUCI-I’m not going to take them down, but I won’t put them on. MR. SEGULJIC-We also have, you know, there’s a big debate all the time, you know, whether safety comes in or not. I think it does, and we just want to have people parking there, that are going to be there at nighttime, we have no idea what the lighting’s like. I would say it’s probably over lit. MR. LEUCI-Once again, I just explained to you, we can close the place down for the evening. The one night a week that’s only maybe July and August, that Great Escape is open after dark, I could put a sign out there, or leave a sign out there, parking is closed after dark. You must remove your car. You really, you talk about one hour, one night a week is what you’re talking about, okay, and I do have lighting out there right now. I do have my low lights, that’s very sufficient, for my security lights, to keep crime off my property. Okay. The lighting I have right now is very sufficient, but I can close the park, I can close the parking after dark. I mean, this is such a low impact thing that I’m doing here. I don’t even know why we have to have a meeting about it. I have 10, 15 cars a day park on my parking lot. Your own enforcement, Bruce, came to me and said, Joe, I’m very sorry, I know you’re not doing anything wrong. It’s ridiculous what they’re asking you to do. Your own people came to see my operation, how I was parking cars, but this is what I have to do. I’m sorry. They tell me to come and I have to cite you, I cite you, but he said you’re the safest parking lot out here. People are very safe. They’re comfortable. They have a sidewalk to walk on, I’m very sorry. This is your own people that come to tell me that. MRS. LEUCI-And we have approved 130 parking spots with the low lighting approvals. It wasn’t a question of lighting, when you gave us the approvals for the parking in 2000. It’s the same parking. It was public parking anyway. MR. HUNSINGER-What this Board does is we enforce the zoning regulations that are adopted by the Town Board, and since you were here in 2000, a new lighting policy has been put into law that we now have to enforce, and so that’s why we’re asking you questions about lighting, that would not have been asked in 1999 or 2000. MRS. LEUCI-The low lights are always on the property, since the Year 2000. Not the high ones, the low ones are, and it’s sufficient lighting, and has not been a complaint to anyone because it’s not eyesore lighting either, but it’s enough lighting to cover a parking lot. MS. BITTER-I think your concern was with regard to the floodlights on the top, and obviously, I think that the applicant has indicated that he will not use those in the evenings. Obviously that can be a condition of your approval, and obviously if he does choose to use them, he could get cited for doing so. So that would be, you know. MRS. LEUCI-But they also are approved to be used up until 8:30 in the evening, during our business hours. MR. SEGULJIC-We have no idea what your lighting is. We have no idea what it is. MRS. BRUNO-Can I ask my fellow Board members, I missed a few of the meetings a few months ago, or last month, and we had an applicant come in front of us that was in a similar situation. They were putting an addition on the building, but they had existing lighting. They were only open until earlier hours at night, the tile business, and if I remember, we tabled that for photo metrics, and could someone just fill me in on where that ended up going on the final meeting? MR. HUNSINGER-They gave us the information. We ended up approving it. MRS. BRUNO-Did they? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-And do you recall what time they did close? That was one question, if I had gone to the meeting. MR. HUNSINGER-No, I don’t. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-Do you remember, anyone else? 12 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-I don’t recall, but remember, in your application, you’re requesting a waiver from lighting requirements. Essentially what we’re saying is we’re not comfortable with that. Because we have a new Code in place. MR. LEUCI-The lighting requirements that I was approved for are much brighter right now, okay. I mean, they’re bright up there because they were still to conduct business, okay. What we’re proposing now is just basically with the low lights on it’s a good oversight of the whole parking lot. People can walk in and out, feel comfortable. I do it for my own security also, so I don’t have kids breaking into my cars, and, if you’re going back to the safety issue, I have no problem closing the parking lot after dark hours, putting a sign up there out there, parking is closed after dark. MR. SEGULJIC-So, I would recommend we table it for a lighting plan, as far as the landscaping and the trees, I don’t know if there’s any impact back there, on the southeast. If they were out on the road, I’d be more concerned. MR. FORD-But they’ve got them here. MRS. BRUNO-And we haven’t even spoken about the display cars on Route 9 right up there. MR. HUNSINGER-No, we haven’t. MR. SEGULJIC-Wasn’t that previously approved, though? MR. HUNSINGER-No. That’s why they were asking for it now. There’s four cars up right next to their driveway. MR. SEGULJIC-And that I have no problem with. They sell cars. MR. HUNSINGER-Susan, the applicant made a comment about a seasonal sign. Can be just a temporary sign? MRS. BARDEN-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MRS. BARDEN-Sure. MR. HUNSINGER-Is lighting, then, the only thing that we have concerns about remaining? MRS. BARDEN-Do you mean temporary seasonal temporary, or seasonal, or temporary just up, put up during the day and taken down at the end of the day? MR. LEUCI-Yes, seasonal. I would keep it up for the season. MR. HUNSINGER-He intended to keep it up for the season. MRS. BARDEN-Okay. You could make that a condition of approval. It would have to be on the plat. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. FORD-Chris, is it possible to make a condition of approval that there would be, that the lighting would be submitted to our engineer, and assured that they met current standards? MR. HUNSINGER-The thing is I’m sure they don’t. They’re not going to meet the Uniformity Ratio. MR. TRAVER-If they’re not operating after dark, does that still leave the lighting on the table? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, and no. One of the questions they asked is, if you’re not operating after dark, is the lighting still on the table. We always have the ability to require the entire site to be brought up to the most current standard. So even if you weren’t proposing any changes to the lighting, even if the new use didn’t require any 13 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) lighting, we still would have the ability to ask for a lighting plan and to analyze your lighting and make you bring your current lighting up to the current Town Code. I don’t have the sense from the Board that that’s our inclination, but I guess the two concerns that I’ve heard were there’s a concern that there might be too bright if all of the lights are on, but then there’s also a concern about safety if it’s light enough. So there’s two issues there. Typically, when you purchase a lighting fixture, there’s a cut sheet that provides a photo metric plan that would provide the information that we would need to determine, you know, those concerns. That, plus, you know, maybe we could all do a site visit and drive by at night when it’s dark and see what it looks like with just the low lights on. Are those on every evening? MR. LEUCI-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-Until 8:30? MR. LEUCI-No, they stay on all night long. MR. HUNSINGER-They stay on all night long. So any one of us could drive by there at any time to determine. MR. FORD-It’s a security issue. MR. LEUCI-It’s a security issue is right. I mean, if it’s a question of re-directing one of my low lights towards the sidewalk, you know, that’s not a problem, but those big lights are not going to be on. Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. LEUCI-We’re not going to be in operating during dark hours, and I’m proposing nothing to change, just exactly the way it is right now. You’ll see where we’re going to have the people walk, it’s a very short walk from the lighted parking lot to the sidewalk. MR. HUNSINGER-When do the lower level lights go on? Are they on a timer, photo metric? MR. LEUCI-They’re on a timer. They go on dark to dark. Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. LEUCI-Although once in a while they get screwed up when we get a black out or something like that. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. Okay. Well, would anyone like to put forward a resolution? Is lighting the only issue? MRS. BRUNO-I think since we’re tabling it, we can request that the walkway be put onto the map, or, excuse me, the sidewalk put onto the map, and the proposed walkway area, so that if we do have any issues with people walking up and down the driveway, you know, we’ve got something documented. MR. HUNSINGER-And if we’re going to table, we should also ask them to address the comments from the engineer. MRS. BRUNO-Yes. MS. BITTER-I already talked to the engineer. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MS. BITTER-I could make the notations on the map that were addressed by Staff and the engineer. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. That would be great. Okay. Do you want to put forward a resolution, Tanya? Actually, for a tabling motion, you can just make a motion to table it pending submission of the following items. You don’t need to follow this. MRS. BRUNO-Right. 14 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MS. BITTER-Chairman, is there going to be a night specific with regards to the tabling motion? MR. HUNSINGER-We got an e-mail. Did the e-mail go out to everybody, for the extra meeting in April? MRS. BARDEN-Yes. th MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, the extra meeting’s the 26. th MRS. BARDEN-The 26. MR. HUNSINGER-Actually, we could pick any of the three April meetings to table it to, ththth for that matter, either the 17, 24, or 26. It’s not going to matter. We did table, I think, th three items to the 17. MR. FORD-So we can get them back next month? thth MR. HUNSINGER-If we want to we can, sure. Submit by April 6 and table it to the 24. th Why don’t we do that. Can you have everything in by next Friday, April 6? MR. LEUCI-I could probably get the lighting stuff in. What else do you need? MS. BITTER-And then just the modifications to the map, right? MRS. BRUNO-Right. th MS. BITTER-Yes, April 6. th MR. HUNSINGER-Okay, and then if you don’t get everything in by April 6, then you’re not going to come before the Board again until May. MS. BITTER-Right. th MR. HUNSINGER-But if you can it in by April 6, then we can table it to an April meeting. th The 24. MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 53-2006 JOSEPH LEUCI MOUNTAIN SIDE AUTO, Introduced by Tanya Bruno who moved for its adoption, seconded by Thomas Seguljic: We’re tabling the current submission for two updates to the current map: 1. The addition of the sidewalk on Route 9 onto the map, 2. A notation where the proposed walkway from the parking area down to the current sidewalk would be, 3. We also need to have some cut sheets of the lighting to determine how compliant the current lighting layout is to our Code, th 4. We’re requesting that this information be submitted by April 6 to be th placed on the April 24 meeting. 5. Also, details on the sign. th Duly adopted this 27 day of March, 2007, by the following vote: MRS. BARDEN-Did you want photo metrics and a sign detail, or did you decide against those two items? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, we should get some details on the sign. MRS. BRUNO-Yes, if we’re asking for it. AYES: Mr. Traver, Mr. Ford, Mr. Seguljic, Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp MS. BITTER-Thank you. 15 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. MR. LEUCI-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-And for the record, I did leave the public hearing open. MS. BITTER-Okay. Thank you. SITE PLAN NO. 2-2007 SEQR TYPE UNLISTED THE MICHAELS GROUP AGENT(S) JAMES MILLER, MILLER ASSOCIATES OWNER(S): SAME ZONING P.U.D. LOCATION MEADOWBROOK ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES A 6,000 SQ. FT. OFFICE BUILDING AND ASSOCIATED SITE WORK. NEW USES IN THE PUD ZONE REQUIRE REVIEW BY THE PLANNING BOARD. CROSS REFERENCE PUD SP 44-2000 WARREN CO. PLANNING N/A LOT SIZE 13.85 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 296.8-1-8.1 SECTION 179-12 JIM MILLER & ERIC WILSON, REPRESENTING APPLICANTS, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Susan, if you could summarize Staff Notes, please. th MRS. BARDEN-Previously this application was tabled to the February 20 meeting. In th response, the applicant responded to Vision Engineering’s February 12 project review comment letter. Subsequently, Vision responded by letter dated March 20. Conditions of the tabling not specifically addressed include no proposed color scheme or sign detail were submitted. The public hearing remains open on this application, and this is a SEQRA Unlisted Action. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. Good evening. MR. MILLER-Good evening. My name is Jim Miller. I’m a landscape architect, and I’m here with Eric Wilson of The Michaels Group. As Susan said, we were here last month and tabled, and we submitted additional information to the Board. The items that were required to be submitted, one of the main ones was responding to the Town Engineer’s comments. We responded in writing and revised the plans. That plans that you have before you are the revised plans that addressed his comments. We’ve since received a signoff letter where he had three minor comments also, which we’ve since completed, but I didn’t get this in time. So these were not on your drawing. The three comments that he had was to show additional silt fencing around the topsoil stockpile and an erosion control plan, which we did. He had some comments. He had asked us for a detail on the stone filter dam at the sediment basin, and we had submitted that and he had some comments on that, and we have since revised that to address his comments and the third item that he mentioned was there was a discrepancy between one of the details of our sewer lateral exiting the building and the site plan. The lateral on the detail showed a four inch sewer line, and the site plan showed a six. On the detail there was supposed to a reducer that showed it going from a four to a six, as it went outside the building. So we did that. We changed that detail. So all those items have been addressed. The other items, there was some issues about the proposed building elevations. If you recall, one of the comments was the building elevation, the east elevation facing Meadowbrook Road, should be reviewed to try to make it look less like the back or the side of the building and enhance that, and that was done at the elevation that was re-submitted. Additional glass was installed there to provide, to make that elevation appear more as a front elevation facing Meadowbrook Road. One of the other comments had to do with the massing of the roof. So the elevations were revised to reduce the roof pitch, so that the proportion of the roof would appear less, and the third change to the elevations was, if you recall in the elevations, there was the lower portion of the building it was going to be the cultured stone, which I believe there was a sample that Eric put here in front of the table, and the cultured stone had stopped at the front south corner of the building, and that was extended around. So when it was viewed from Meadowbrook Road, the stone continues around the side. The only area it wasn’t was the areas toward the back. One of the other comments had to do with the lighting, and as we had discussed at the meeting, the lights in the parking lot were reduced from 150 watt high pressure sodium down to 100 watts, and as a result of that, the average lighting in the parking lot went from 3.2 foot candles to 1.8, and the ratio was reduced from 3.2 to 1 to 3 to 1, and in addition, there was discussion about the lighting and how long the lighting would be on at night, as we’ve discussed last month, that this is a professional office building. It’s not anticipated there’ll be night hours. So whenever the business is closed, whether it be 6:00 or 7:00, the parking lot lights will be shut off, and the only lights that will remain on will be the down lights along the building entrances for security. There was some comments, both from the City Engineer, or from the Town 16 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) Engineer and the public about drainage. We worked with Dan Ryan. He asked for some additional calculations and in working with him, some modifications were made to the storm drainage plan. The stone eaves trenches that collect runoff from the roof were increased, and the stormwater basin to the rear of the building that collects the stormwater from the parking lot, the outlet of that basin was decreased in size from a six inch to a four inch, which would detain additional stormwater and detain it longer on the site, and Dan has reviewed these additional calculations and revisions, and has signed off on those. The other issue that was discussed was buffering. Our parking area on the north side of the office building faces the Waverly Place. We have, the Town’s Code requires a Type A buffer, which is a 10 foot wide buffer which requires one tree per 100 square feet. What we’ve provided as buffering along that side was a buffer that ranges in size, this is from our property line, from 25 feet to 55 feet. That property line’s approximately 300 feet long, which would be required to install three trees, and in that buffer area we’ve proposed four shade trees that are three to three and a half inch caliper, and fourteen evergreens which will range in height from four to eight feet to provide a pretty substantial buffer along that parking area to screen the parking area and the cars that are in there. There was some question about the dumpster. The dumpster is located to the rear of the property, to the rear of the building, and that dumpster area will be enclosed with a six foot high fence. In addition to the screen fence, there’s additional planting around that dumpster and on the side facing the Waverly Place residents, there will be four Norway Spruce planted along there to buffer that. One of the, we received our copy of the resolution, after I had submitted, and one of the items that we did not include, and I guess I had missed that, had to do with a design of a sign. We put together a schematic design. I know I’m not submit information, but I’d like to just pass this around so you could see what our intent is. As we discussed at the meeting, that we don’t have any known tenants for this building, and it could range from one to three tenants, the intent is this is going to be a fairly small sign. It’s going to comply with the Town’s Code. It meets the 15 foot setback. Since we’re not open at night, the sign will not be lit, and it’s intended that it’s going to be a wood sign, either a carved or sandblasted type sign, with a sign panel probably a dark green with a gold leaf letter style, but, you know, something tasteful. A professional sign that meets all the Codes, and we would imagine that if we had three tenants, the sign would identify those three tenants. So that was the intent of the sign. We brought the color panels and things back. If you remember, we talked about the buildings being earth tones with the cultured stone at the lower level, and we’ve brought those samples along, in case we didn’t remember what we talked about, about those last month, and I think with that we had addressed, you know, that addressed the questions and issues that were brought up. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. I will open it up for questions and comments from the Board. MR. FORD-I’d be glad to hold mine until I’ve heard the public input. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. They want to hear the public first. I will open the public hearing. I know there’s several people here that want to make comments to the Board on this application. I would just ask that you address your comments to the Board. If you have specific questions, we will ask the questions from the applicant. When you approach the table, if you could just state your name for the record, before you give your comments. PUBLIC HEARING OPEN RICHARD BESTHOFF MR. BESTHOFF-My name is Richard Besthoff, and I live at Waverly Place. This gentleman just painted a beautiful picture of a beautiful building, but I think a number of the problems have not been addressed. Number One, in making reference to the Vision th Engineering letter dated February 12, and we speak about stormwater management report, and I speak about Paragraph I. They speak about the hydraulic analysis indicates that all of the runoff from the site flows to the stormwater basin and is meted out through the regulated outlet. Then they had a Drawing SP-2 that says an emergency overflow spillway is shown on the stormwater basin, but no specs or details are provided. Drawing SP-3 said there are large quantities of fill to be imported to accommodate this site. Now, at Waverly Place, most of the homes are built on clay. So it doesn’t take the water too well. Number Two, all along Meadowbrook Road from Haviland Road to Cronin Road, we’ve had continuous water problems. I mean, I’m talking about flooding. Every time that it rains, we take water. Homes on the south end of Waverly Place take water. When that catch basin fills up, water goes back up into those homes, and everybody’s now had to install sump pumps and still the sump pumps sometimes cannot 17 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) handle the water. Now I’ve taken photos, and these, as they say photos are worth a th thousand words, these pictures were taken on the 15 of this month, after a rainfall. Now I would like to take that stand here and bring it in front of you so I can show you exactly the impact of the rain in the area where they want to build. Now if they’re going to put more fill in there and they’re going to build this and they’re going to bring it up, the water is going to seek its lowest level, and if the water seeks the lowest level, it’s not only going to flood more into our catch basin behind the Waverly homes, but all the other homes, there’s a home right down on Waverly Place, there’s a farm that when it rains it actually has waterfront property, and I’m going to show you here, because these pictures I took, there’s about a dozen pictures here, and it’s very specific, and I would really like to bring it to your attention. It’s all well and good to see the kind of shingles we’re going to put up, and the kind of lighting that we’re going to have and they’re going to lower the lighting and shut the lights off at night. This is the problem. The problem is not what kind of shingles we’re going to have, and if it would be okay with you if I could bring this. MR. HUNSINGER-Sure, go ahead, and if you could take the mic right out of the stand there, bring the mic with you. MR. BESTHOFF-Actually, if we look at the first one here, the first picture shows The Michaels Group sign. Right behind The Michaels Group sign, there’s flooding back here. We take a look over here. These are the Waverly homes on the south end of the property. This is all flooded now with the rain. If we take a look at this one here, this is more of a close up of this picture here. MR. FORD-Excuse me, sir. In that first picture, the flooding back of The Michaels Group sign. MR. BESTHOFF-Yes. MR. FORD-Approximately how far back is that, how many feet? Could you give an estimate, please. MR. BESTHOFF-I would give you an estimate, probably less than 100 feet from that sign, and that sign is like right on the road. If we go over here, like I said, this here is the picture of the flooding in that catch basin right behind the homes, and we’re not talking about a thunderstorm. We’re talking about the little bit of rain that we had with the little bit of the melting of the snow. This here is an enlarged picture of this here, showing right behind The Michaels where they want to build, the flooding in the back. If we take a look here, we’ll see here’s The Michaels Group sign showing that it’s not a prefabricated photo. Here is the flooding over here. We take a look here. Here is the sign where The Michaels Group is going to be building back here. This shows you all the flooding back in this area here. We take a look at this. This little, I’ll call it a monument, but it’s not a monument, this is this here, just an enlarged view showing you the flooding. This is the rear of the work site, of the Waverly Place homes are right over here, the flooding in the back. This is the farmhouse right down on Meadowbrook. Here’s the flooding. Here’s the farmhouse back in here. All the flooding, right up to the road. All of this flooding here, here’s the farmhouse, right up to the road, it’s all flooded. It’s flooded. It’s flooded . Here it’s flooded. I can’t understand how they’re going to build, put fill in there and have more water runoff into an already flooded area. I think we really have to take a good look at it. I really would like you to give some careful thought to this, and I’ll leave the pictures with you, but I think it’s very important for you not to give your approval to this project at this time. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. MR. FORD-Your suggestion for timing would be what, sir? MR. BESTHOFF-Well, for you to consider the photos and the problems that we have with the flooding. If you take a look at the stormwater management report for that area, they’ve got that 100 year plan or something or other, this is terrible, and we didn’t have a bad storm. You can only imagine if they put another building in there, and they put fill in there where that water is going to go. MRS. BRUNO-You’re saying that the houses that are in Picture Two are the ones that are filling, that are now requiring sump pumps? MR. BESTHOFF-Yes, ma’am. 18 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. FORD-Do you know, offhand, how many there on the south side require sump pumps? MR. BESTHOFF-Probably three or four at this time, but I live on the other end, and I’m on high ground, and because there’s all clay, I had to install a sump pump because water’s backing up into my basement. So it’s not just, this item is just for the problem of that building down south, but because of the clay, the water doesn’t absorb into the ground. MR. SEGULJIC-Excuse me. So the homes you’re speaking of have basements? MR. BESTHOFF-Yes, sir. MR. SEGULJIC-And sump pumps in the basements. MR. BESTHOFF-Yes, they do. MR. SEGULJIC-And when were these, these sump pumps were recently installed. So initially, when the homes were constructed and the people moved in, there wasn’t a water problem, and now it’s a recent phenomenon. Is that what you’re saying? MR. BESTHOFF-No, no, no. It’s been an ongoing problem. MR. SEGULJIC-It’s always been an issue? MR. BESTHOFF-Yes, sir. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. BESTHOFF-But I would hate to see them add to the problem by funneling more water down into that. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. FORD-What you’re saying is that that wetland is modified in a negative, it has a negative impact, it is negatively impacted by sump pumps and other drainage from Waverly Place? MR. BESTHOFF-No. MR. FORD-Where does that water go, sir? MR. BESTHOFF-Probably out into the sewer system, that the sump pump is pumping, they pump the water out into the sewer system. They don’t pump it out into those catch basins. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. MR. BESTHOFF-Thank you. MR. SEGULJIC-One other question. You had said something about a catch basin? MR. BESTHOFF-Well, I use that term. I may not be using the right term, but I can show you what I’m making reference to. MR. SEGULJIC-Yes, can you show me on the map, on their map? MR. BESTHOFF-On their map? MR. SEGULJIC-Yes. MR. BESTHOFF-I probably couldn’t because the catch basin that I’m speaking of is, I call it a catch basin. See the cattails or whatever they are over here? This water, that’s where the water drains down here, in here. MR. FORD-It’s a designated wetland. Is it not? MR. BESTHOFF-It could be. I can’t tell you that I know. It could be a designated wetland because that’s where the water is. 19 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. FORD-Army Corps of Engineers has designated that as a wetland. MR. BESTHOFF-Okay. MRS. BRUNO-And beyond that, closer to the houses, is the stormwater basin that was designed for when the houses went in. Staff, have we gotten any notice from other Town employees that the stormwater basin wasn’t working to design standards? MS. ALTER-No, but a number of people addressed comments to the Town Board because they didn’t understand where the comments should go, and I told them the th wrong date of the meeting because I thought it was going to be April 17. That was the letter I passed out to you earlier. So there were three people who called me and spoke to me personally, but they were all conveying the same thing this gentleman is saying. He wasn’t one of the ones I spoke to. th MR. BESTHOFF-I would have been ready for the 17. I just didn’t know that this was going on tonight. MS. ALTER-I apologize for that. MR. BESTHOFF-But again, all of this flooding is a direct result. This here is just south of where they want to build. So if they’re going to put property and fill there, the water is going to run down and it’s going to be more of a problem for this area down here. This is right off the road. You can’t walk five feet off the road and you go into where the water is. So, should I leave that with you? MR. HUNSINGER-You can leave that there, yes. Thank you. Anyone else have comments for the Board? Yes, sir. DOUG COON MR. COON-Hi. I’m Doug Coon, and I live just to the south. I’m probably the farm he’s talking about that floods. I’d like to take a look at that, if I could, his pictures. MR. HUNSINGER-Sure. MR. COON-He’s correct. The part of my land that is right on Meadowbrook floods several times a year and actually more so since Schermerhorn has done his work, just to the south of my place. I mean, it floods quite a bit. You could put a rowboat on it, and row around and fish off of it, and he’s right. That’s the lowest area, and it not only floods my area, but it floods right across the road. It’s right near where that sewer system is there, and so of course I’m concerned, too, because anything you do there is going to, it’s not going to alleviate the situation. It’s going to probably hinder it. I’ve got a couple of notes here. I’m not an engineer, and they made reference to reducing an orifice from six inches to four inches to provide slower release to the existing wetland, and that may make some sense, but by going from six inch to four inch, again, I’m not an engineer. I’m just wondering if that will overflow quicker, because you’re going from six to four now. So it doesn’t seem to make logical sense to me, but again, I would defer that to somebody else more intelligent than I am on that. I saw in some notes that I read in the file also that Mr. Brown had asked them apparently to extend a pipe from the south side of the building to the storm basin to collect the overflow, and somebody, whoever answered that, said that they felt that was impractical to do it. Anything to do with the water situation should be addressed. It’s really terrible, now what he said is true. I mean, it doesn’t take a storm to make that overflow. That road, Meadowbrook overflows, it floods regularly, and it’s probably worse this time of year because the frost is in the ground. There’s a stream there that overflows. As soon as that overflows, and the culvert underneath Meadowbrook gets clogged, that road is overflowing, and his pictures are very accurate. So I’m not saying I’m against the project. I’m just saying that this has got to have a hard look at this stormwater. That’s my point, or very hard look at it, because Schermerhorn’s, I was at some of the meetings when they did their projects, and everything seemed to be fine, but since that has happened, the water problem has worsened. I mean, it makes sense that it would, and it has, and so this isn’t going to help anything. I’m not against the project. It seems to be fine on paper, but this part really needs to be addressed and looked at very finely. Okay. Enough on the drainage. A couple of other points I had. I see that they put additional roof cuts and gables in the building, and that’s good, but remember, that building is lower than the ones across the street. So you’re going to be noticing it that much more, and being that it’s a lower building, I mean, you’re going to be looking at that roofline before you would look at 20 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) higher buildings across the street, and I think it could use a few more roof cuts and gables. I mean, because, you know, your eye is going to see that before you see, it’ll be, your eye will go to that first, and then the buildings across the street. There should be some roof cuts and gables there, and I’m not sure that, it kind of continues the scheme that you’ve got across the street. Okay. They made a point of continuing the stone around the south side of that building, and that’s important. I think that’s an improvement, because when people come up Meadowbrook Road from the south side and they’re approaching the that building, they’re traveling north, they’ll see that building, and so that stonework that’s there, it’s nice to continue that, but what they should also do, in my opinion, is they should keep that landscaping plan to flow right around that south side, too. The landscaping plan goes on the north side, and also faces Meadowbrook on the east side, but it should also flow right around the south side. I’m not saying put it behind the building. I mean, behind the building is what I’m looking at, but put it on the south side anyway, so that when people come up the road from that end, they’re going to see the landscaping plan continued, right with the stonework that they just included, which was an improvement as I said. I mean, that would make a lot of sense to me. I think that’s it. I mean, I guess the last couple of points are aesthetics, and, you know, again, I’m not against this thing, but certainly the drainage has really got to be gone over with a fine tooth comb, because whatever’s in place now is not working. It’s not working. I’m sorry to have to say that, but this man’s pretty accurate. Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Anyone else? Yes, sir. BILL LUETH MR. LUETH-My name is Bill Lueth, and I live on Chelsea Place, in Waverly Place, which is at the south of the subdivision. I guess you gather there’s a drainage problem. Academic for me to say much more about it other than a point of clarification. My neighbor has already wrung out the major problems, but we do feed our runoff water into the wetland. It is a wetland, and it is a marsh. The sump pump that I use does feed into it. Bear with me, Richard, it’s a correction, but we have a drainage from our development that feeds right into the marsh. So it’s just a point of clarification, and that we do feed the runoff water into it. When it rains, and it doesn’t have to be an awful heavy rain, my backyard floods, and my back yard is probably, I’m guessing, four to five feet higher than the marsh itself. Eventually it does drain off into it, and it does head south through the marsh out into the gentleman’s front lawn who has just finished speaking, but anybody here who’s driven over Meadowbrook knows that it is a lake. As a matter of fact, I enjoy the water fowl that collect there, but I guess that’s about as much as I can say relative to drainage. You realize there is a major concern. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. Anyone else? MR. FORD-Excuse me. I have a question. You have a sump pump in your basement? MR. LUETH-Absolutely. As a matter of fact, I use a sump pump, and I have a battery back up to it, and I would like to get a third in there. Every time it rains, I shudder. Does that answer you, sir? MR. FORD-Yes. Thanks. ELIZABETH JOHANSSEN MS. JOHANSSEN-My name is Elizabeth Johanssen. CAROL WINSLOW MS. WINSLOW-And I’m Carol Winslow. MS. JOHANSSEN-We both work at the Glen at Hiland Meadows, which is across the street from Waverly Place, and we just wanted to reiterate what that first man said about Meadowbrook Road flooding. We are on the other side of Waverly Place, and we wait tables in the dining room at he Glen, and that floods. MR. FORD-The dining room floods? MS. JOHANSSEN-Yes. The dining room, like water will leak in, and if that’s what’s going on across the street, I can only imagine what’s going on at Waverly Place when they are lower than we are, and I feel for this man who’s got the farm and have it flood in the littlest bit of rain, and I just want you to think before you build this, let them build this 21 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) office and let these people’s homes flood even worse than they already are, because I’ve seen what happens, just going in to work at the Glen on the other side. I’ve hydroplaned so many times just from a little bit of rain. MS. WINSLOW-And we’re going slow. We’re not like, it’s right when you turn onto, from the stop sign, and you take a left, and you can hydroplane so easily. MS. JOHANSSEN-We just wanted you to think of what could happen to the people at Waverly Place. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. MR. FORD-How do you accommodate the flooding in the dining room? MS. JOHANSSEN-We put towels down. There’s, this winter was the worse with the big snow storms. The snow went higher than the dining room itself, and it seeped in. MS. WINSLOW-Because it doesn’t soak into the ground. It just keeps building, and it’s like way past, like above the doors. MR. FORD-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. MS. JOHANSSEN-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Anyone else? Yes, sir. DICK O’CONNOR MR. O'CONNOR-My name is Dick O’Connor. I live on Chelsea Place and face the back, the water, and I’ll be looking at the back yard of this building, but these other people that addressed the flooding along Meadowbrook Road, I’d like to point out that the most recent building put there, the Girl Scouts’ place, has been a very big contributor to the flooding along that road. I think it was poorly engineered, or poorly installed, one of the two, to have that much parking lot draining into Meadowbrook Road and creating a hazard when you have melt and freezing, melting and freezing, as well as just the rain take away. Now the next step up there is the Schermerhorn operation. He put a little pond in there, a catch basin, if you will, but the water comes out. It was big 14 inch pipes, fully. It’s like a big fire hose coming out when it rains, and that’s contributing to the gentleman’s, farmer’s property, and that’s where all the water goes, and now you’re talking about pushing water down the other way. I think you have a major water management problem along Meadowbrook Road, and that should be considered with this project. Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Anyone else? MRS. BRUNO-Susan, could we zoom out of that a bit to maybe incorporate the farm and the edge of the Schermerhorn property? MRS. BARDEN-Sure. MRS. BRUNO-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other comments from the public? MRS. BARDEN-I have one written comment. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. I will leave the public hearing open. How long is the letter, Susan? MS. ALTER-This is from Michael Siegel, Chairman Chris Hunsinger and Board members, “We are homeowners and residents of Waverly Place. We are presently traveling and were unable to attend the recent Planning Board meeting. We have expected the Michaels Group to propose their Business Building as per their very lovely sign on the Meadowbrook Property – posted many months ago. The obvious problems of increased traffic and wetlands has been constant. Perhaps that’s the reason for the name “Meadowbrook Road”, which floods in the spring with overflowing wetlands. The proposed parking area will further limit ground water absorption in this area. The set 22 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) back from the road will be another problem with increased traffic turning into the parking area. The building as proposed certainly looks nice, but we ask you to please consider the surrounding area upon which it will be constructed and the homeowners who live in this area and need to use Meadowbrook Road to access their homes. We thank you for your kind consideration. Sincerely, Gilda and Michael Siegel 12 Chelsea Place, Queensbury, NY” MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. MR. MILLER-Thank you. Jim Miller, again. I’d like to start by saying that I don’t disagree with everything people have said. This is our grading plan. Now this area, unfortunately I don’t have a larger map. This area has always been prone to flooding, and there’s a drainage way that comes down through there and Halfway Brook. As a matter of fact, this is the subdivision map of Waverly Place. It kind of shows you a little bit of what’s going on. Our site is this one here, and there’s a stream that flows from Haviland, that flows down through the back here along that property line, comes along, comes around Mr. Coon’s property, crosses Meadowbrook, goes back behind Schermerhorn’s and out through the golf course. This whole area has always flooded. It’s a low collection point, and all these wetlands that you see on this map were all flagged and mapped when this project was done, when Waverly Place was done, and then our grading plan that we have here depicts those same wetlands, and they’re obviously wetlands for a reason. Wetlands flood in the spring. That’s what they’re there for. That’s what they do, and this whole area has a pattern of wetlands that come down through and then out and through the Hiland Golf Course. It’s always going to be that way, and if you look here, the stream is out in the back. Our property is this area here. This is actually the stream back here that goes up behind Waverly Place and down across Meadowbrook Road, and this hatching that we depict here, this wetland is DEC wetland, okay. So DEC wetland is, we’re required to have a 100 foot setback, which is this line through here. So that was the only part that was DEC wetland, but what happens is there’s a series of low areas, as a matter of fact one comes way up in. This is a culvert that comes back, it comes from The Glen at Hiland. It comes off of their property, comes down under here, feeds this wetland, and goes back out into the stream. This area in here is one of the existing detention basins from Waverly Place. Their storm drainage, their catch basins that are in the road come down, drain into this, and there’s a controlled outlet. MR. FORD-And their sump pumps pump into that? MR. MILLER-It has to go into a storm system. It’s illegal to go into a sewer. So it would either, they would either discharge out into this storm basin or into this storm drainage system, the catch basins that are along here which discharge into here. MR. FORD-Or the U.S. Corps of Engineers wetland. MR. MILLER-You could, but typically in a subdivision built in current standards, any sump pump are discharged into storm drainage system. I can’t verify where they go. MR. FORD-I’m sure they probably discharge there. Where that water winds up is. MR. MILLER-They probably do. So I don’t disagree with all that. This whole area. MRS. BRUNO-I’m sorry, before you go any further, I was noticing on your grading plan, do you have an elevation marks from the original? MR. MILLER-That’s erosion control. MRS. BRUNO-Yes, I’ve looked through all of them. I was just wondering if on the, it doesn’t go off site, I was wondering if on the bigger plan that you were showing, what your elevation is on the? MR. MILLER-Well, I can show you this photograph. Here is a photograph taken from Meadowbrook. That’s the sign that was referenced. So you can see that the elevation where we’re proposing the residences is close to the elevation of, you’re looking at Chelsea Place, those there. So it’s fairly close. What happens is this drops down into this wet area and then comes back up. So, you know, obviously the stream flows all the way around, which is fairly level. So the higher grade that’s being developed all through here is pretty similar. 23 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MRS. BRUNO-I’m sorry. I don’t mean to beg the point. We’re looking at a finished floor height on the proposed building at 311, and the lowest I can see is a 303 on the outskirts. MR. MILLER-302 into the wetland, yes. MRS. BRUNO-Where are you seeing the 302? I must have overlooked it. MR. MILLER-Down in this area. It goes down to 302. MRS. BRUNO-That’s what I was missing. So we’ve got nine feet difference there, and you’re proposing that the houses are at approximately 310 or 311, too. MR. FORD-Chelsea Place would be at 311? MR. MILLER-I can’t swear to it, but I would say it’s fairly close, but if you look at the map, you know, the wetland’s like nine feet down. So if you were at 310, 311, you had a basement, you’re pretty close to groundwater. I mean, there’s no basement in this building, which we had talked about. MRS. BRUNO-Right. MR. MILLER-So it’s probably fairly close, but, you know, as far as the filling that was discussed, it’s area that floods, and I don’t disagree. All this wetland and all up in through here, it does flood in this low area, and we’re not filling in those areas. Our fill, you know, we’re filling in, you know, if you look at the photo there, the areas we’re filling in, this is the high point of the site that you’re looking at, and the grade drops off. The flooding occurs out into this area. So we’re just filling the areas here that basically flatten the parking lot. I mean, it slopes off steeper than you’d want a parking lot to be. So we’re filling that. So we’re not filling in any wetlands. We’re not in any of the areas that are flooding. So I don’t disagree this area is flooding, and I understand the concern, but, you know, we’ve got, you know, of our 1.6 acre site, 75% of it is permeable space. So what we’ve done is we’ve had to work around the wetlands and the constraints of the site. Obviously, if we had no constraints or if we tried to fill wetland area and things, we’d probably have twice the size building there. So what we’ve tried to do is utilize that existing high ground, and minimize our impacts on the surrounding wetlands. No different than has been done in say Waverly Place. MR. FORD-I have a question. If you’re taking an area that is already flooding, it’s already wetlands, surrounding your parcel, and you make that, even 25% of it non- permeable, convince me that that is not going to add to the existing problem and make it worse? MR. MILLER-Well, what we have to do under the new storm regs is we have to run calculations, right now this existing site is mounded, it’s open grass. So we have to run calculations for various storms, one year, ten year, fifty year storms, and it calculates out the amount of water that flows off our site during those storms. What we’re required to do, as part of our stormwater management, is if we run the calculations, if we build this building and build this parking lot and that all runs off unimpeded, that is going to increase not only the volume of water that drains off the site, because it’s not being absorbed, but it also increases the velocity that flows off, and a lot of times the velocity is a worse problem than the volume. So what we’re required to do is we are collecting that water in the parking lot, and we’re taking it into this back basin. So all the runoff that, you know, would normally filter off into the wetland, now we’re collecting it into that back basin and then what we do from this basin is release it gradually. There was one comment I heard where there’s 14 inch pipes coming out of a storm basin that’s flowing full. Most likely that’s not supposed to happen, because what’s required to control this runoff is you design the outlet structure and what you do is you put a restrictor where you reduce the size of the outlet structure, and that’s what controls the flow of the water that gets released. So it’s a combination of, you’ve got an outlet structure that provides a gradual release, and then the other side of the calculation is the volume calculation. You have to provide a basin big enough to hold that increased water you’re draining, so that you’re releasing it gradually. So that’s what we’re required to do, and all the drainage from this site here, the stream flows down this way and goes this way. So the water released here is heading further south, but that’s what’s required, and, you know, there are cases where stormwater devices are altered, and they drain more than they should, but that’s sort of a policing action. They shouldn’t flow full, but that was our proposal where we tried to be as sensitive to this as we can. We understand the concerns of the neighbors. As a matter of fact, if you remember our first presentation, we talked about a 24 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) basement in the lower level there, and one of the reasons we didn’t do that is we felt we’d have to raise the building a couple of feet higher in order to get that lower level up out of the groundwater and then our building’s going to be sitting too high along Meadowbrook Road and look kind of funny. So we opted to not put a lower level in the building. We just went with a single floor. MR. FORD-Thank you. MRS. BRUNO-That stream, I don’t recall, south of this, this stream does flow under the road in a culvert? MR. MILLER-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. MR. MILLER-Yes, it does, and that whole area, I mean, all the neighbors are right. I mean, the girls that were talking about The Glen at Hiland, they have some unusual groundwater conditions up there that aren’t necessarily a drainage thing, because we were doing some work with them, and as a matter of fact I was over there one time, there was an electrical outlet right in the middle of a room like this, and you took the cover plate up, there was water in it, and they actually, when, you know, they were trying to solve the problem, they drilled holes through their foundation, and for some reason there was hydrostatic pressure inside the building in their foundation that was causing some of the problem, and they were telling me that when they drilled holes, it actually, the water was actually draining up through the foundation wall. So they have kind of an unusual problem. The other thing, not everything is groundwater. When you get, you know, I live in a real sandy area and it’s like 20 feet to groundwater. This time of year I’ll get water in my basement. What happens, the ground is frozen. You get a nice warm day and it’s raining, the water comes off. It comes down the side of your foundation and comes right in your footings, and it’s the only time of the year I’ll get water. So sometimes it’s roof water, it’s rain water. Sometimes it’s groundwater. So it’s not all totally related to groundwater. Each condition is a little different. Groundwater and hydraulic soils, it’s kind of a spooky thing. MRS. BRUNO-Were you the engineer on record for The Glen at Hiland? MR. MILLER-No. I did some additional work for them. They were doing some expansion of some parking lots and things, and that’s how I know about that. MR. SEGULJIC-I know a fine landscape architect such as yourself can handle the stormwater on the site, but my concern is about off site, and I think what we’re seeing here is a case of incrementalism. Because every time we fill in a little more, the water has to go somewhere else, and my concern is you have that six feet of fill next to the Army Corps wetland area. I think the site is great. You can manage the stormwater on site, but what’s going to happen elsewhere? And as a matter of fact, I talked to our Town Engineer, Dan Ryan, about this, and what he said was, and I’ll just go right to the conclusion. Based on the review data, because he was hopefully aware of what’s going on, it appears that this site will have little or no impact on localized flooding or any pre- development flood storage capacity, which I believe is what you’re saying also, but I guess, and I’ll throw this out to the Board, once again we have a case here of incrementalism. This project, in and of itself alone wouldn’t cause a problem. It’s the fact that everything else is happening. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. FORD-Yes. MR. SEGULJIC-I guess what I would like to do is go back to Mr. Ryan and say, flesh out this localized flooding for me. What exactly are you saying with that? Are you confident that this is the best designed project? Is there anything else we can do to help alleviate this problem? Because, you know, I don’t know if there is. To me it appears to be an overall watershed issue. I mean, we’ve allowed too much filling in there in the first place. MR. MILLER-Well, I don’t think it’s a filling issue. This is a natural occurrence. I mean, it’s a wetland and it’s been a wetland. I think that the thing is we’ve got a lot more people living around there now. So more people see it than used to see it, but the other side of this is one of the things that the new DEC regulations, I mean, they’ve come into effect, I mean, this Town has required stormwater requirements before DEC did. DEC came out with their stuff which is more stringent, and DEC, what they’re trying to do is address 25 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) what you’re talking about, is this incremental flooding problem. That has been a problem in the past, where there’s been development and they’ve been increasing runoff into areas like this. It is a problem, but, you know, DEC’s approach to this, which I believe is absolutely correct, is you don’t want to deal with it on large scale. You want to deal with it as a project by project basis, and that’s what their requirements do. They make us go through, we fall under DEC because we’re under an acre of disturbance, but we still have to address this project on a similar basis as if it was a DEC project, but, you know, their solution is that if each development that happens has its own stormwater management controls, and these stormwater reports are in place and adhered to, that’s going to control the runoff from each of these sites, which is going to avoid the flooding issues and the problems that have occurred downstream, but obviously each project’s got to be reviewed, and these management devices have to be maintained, and new DEC requirements actually make us, in our reports, talk about how these systems have to be maintained and the owners who, the applicants actually have to sign these documents now. MR. SEGULJIC-And I agree with you and I understand what you’re saying, but once again, my problem is you’re essentially building a six foot wall along the wetland area, which you’re allowed to build right up to, and you’re impeding it’s, these wetlands move, as I understand it. They’re nature is shock absorbing, and they have to move around. You’re impeding its movement, half of its allowed movement. So in theory it’s got to move the other way now. MR. MILLER-I don’t think that happens, because what happens is this is a high piece of land that comes out into this wetland, and obviously the low area here is the stream. So what we’re looking at is basically, you know, the floodplain of this stream area, where as this stream floods, the water migrates up into these wetland areas, and then the stream recedes, they drain back down. This area where we’re doing the construction now is above that. So, I mean, basically, you know, we’ve got a slope that goes down to the edge of the wetland. Where we’re doing our filling isn’t in where it’s flooding. We’re in the upland portion, which is why, you know, we have to go through all the mappings of the wetlands and have these things done by the biologist before we start our design. MR. SEGULJIC-But don’t these wetlands move over time? MR. MILLER-I don’t think this one does, to tell you the truth. I mean, we’ve got a stream that comes down through here, and what happens, you’ve got fluctuating water level, and the water flows out into these fingers of wetlands, and then it drains back down. MR. SEGULJIC-Now you’re taking away that capacity, where it flows out. MR. MILLER-We’re not filling in where it’s flooding. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, can I ask one more question? There’s, the three trees that are across the center of the site, which were in the photographs. I believe it was the th February 16, because I went by the site to look at it, there was water extending all the way out to there. MR. MILLER-That’s back into this area back here, exactly. You’re absolutely right. MR. SEGULJIC-So you’re saying those trees, I thought it was more where the building was, more in the center of the site. MR. MILLER-I don’t think so. I mean, here’s the photo, and you can see, this is the area where we’re building, and it comes out in the back and it falls off and then that low area comes around further to the south, and I don’t disagree with that. MR. FORD-It’s interesting that in back to back weeks we have dealt with two pretty sizeable projects on Meadowbrook Road. Just last week, we were told about the wetland further to the south where mitigation could not be accomplished. MR. MILLER-This is at Girl Scouts. MR. FORD-Exactly, because it isn’t a dormant situation. It’s fluctuating. It’s changing, and the original plan could not be accomplished because of that lack of dormancy. It was changing and they’re having to go back to a different form of mitigation, a different plan, and there are those of us who believe that that probably is a result of the structural, the structures being built in and around that area, and I don’t doubt but what this is going to have a similar impact on this because that, while it changes and the rate of flow 26 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) increases and decreases and that wetland expands and contracts, but I’m not yet convinced that more building in that area is not going to detract from that, or I don’t see where it’s going to do anything but make a bad situation worse. MR. MILLER-Well, I think the Girl Scout situation is a little different. I mean, that’s probably the lowest point of Meadowbrook. I mean, that’s probably as low as the one that’s just south of here, and I don’t know the details of that one. MR. FORD-It’s just against that back drop that we now come to this. MR. MILLER-I mean, this is sort of, you know, all along this wetland there’s upland areas which, you know, we’ve referred to them as buildable areas, and, you know, that’s what we’ve tried to do here is take this lot that’s been identified as an office lot and try to come up with as responsible a design on that upland piece as we can, and, you know, all I can tell you is all the wetlands have been flagged, and we haven’t encroached in them. I mean, even in an Army Corps wetland, you can even encroach 10% without getting a permit from them, and we haven’t encroached at all on any of them. We’ve stayed back out of all of that because of these concerns. MR. FORD-And would you reiterate please, again, the elevation, and if you could compare the elevation of that slab with the elevation, no, you may not be able to because you don’t know about Chelsea Place and what some of those elevations would be on those basement floors. MR. MILLER-I mean, I can show you what we’ve got, is down here this is where the sewer line crosses, the stream crosses. There’s a 306 here on Meadowbrook. It comes up to 308. It’s at 310 on our site. That’s the high point, Meadowbrook, across the front of our lot. Our driveway is just at the south point, and then it drops back down again to where the culvert crosses here and this wetland comes across, and then it comes back up towards Haviland. So you can see, this is the highest point along this area of Meadowbrook, and then as you go back into the wetlands, the surveyor doesn’t label these things enough. I can never find the elevations when I need to, but you can see here at the outlet on the back of our basins is 302 to 311. So there’s nine foot, and the existing grade here is at 320. So the existing grade on our site drops from 310 down to 302. So, I mean, we’re eight foot of upland. MR. FORD-You can see that drop from Meadowbrook. MR. MILLER-Yes. So, what we’ve done is we’ve raised our finished floor up a little bit to maintain some pitch away from the building, and we do fill in the back area here, but, you know, we’re still maintaining all the flood prone areas as they are now down at that 302 elevation. MR. FORD-May I just ask one other question. If you’re going to confine it all in that catch basin, all of the runoff water, from the structure as well as the parking lot, eventually that water is going to go some place, isn’t it? MR. MILLER-It’s going to go right where it goes now. It’s going to go into this wetland and into this watershed. I mean, all we can do is control the release of it. We can contain it and we can control it, and that’s what we’re required to do, because I mean right now it drains into it. Right now, it rains here and it flows off into that wetland. So, you know, to try to do a responsible stormwater design, you try to make your stormwater management controls sort of mimic as much as you can the current conditions, and one of the comments that you’re hearing is that a lot of the soils here are very clay. If we run our stormwater calculations, you have a very sandy soil. You get minimal runoff from a site. If you get a very heavy clay soil, you’ll get 70, 75% of the runoff from grass will sheet off clay soil because it’s not being absorbed. So actually when you develop on clay soil, your impact’s actually less than when it’s on sand. MRS. BRUNO-Mr. Miller, your client is here with you this evening, and I’m wondering if he perhaps, I’m sure he is aware of the problems in the basements over in Waverly Place, at this point, and I was wondering if he perhaps knew what the elevation is, or are, of the closest houses in the basement floor finished, the basement finished floor elevation. MR. WILSON-Again, my name’s Eric Wilson with The Michaels Group. Let me first state, I don’t know of any problems in Waverly Place, and what I mean by that is I get updated from our service department by the hour, and even though these units have 27 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) been in for anywhere from three to four years now, if there was a flood, or water entering a basement, we would get a phone call, and I’ve only had. MRS. BRUNO-Are these privately owned at this point or are they rented? MR. WILSON-They are privately owned. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. MR. WILSON-They still call our service department, and we would want them to. If there was water coming in their basement, if they had a flooding issue in their basement, I would want to know about it. MR. FORD-May I ask a question for just a moment? MR. WILSON-Absolutely. MR. FORD-May I see a show of hands of anyone in the audience who has a? MR. HUNSINGER-They already said on the record that they had some issues. MR. FORD-They’ve got problems. MR. WILSON-No, they said that their sump pumps are running. I’m saying there’s no flooding. They don’t have water coming in to the basements. Every unit is designed, they’re laughing, but every unit is designed to have the four inch ADS pipe on the inside and the outside of the footing to collect the water and get it away from the house. That’s exactly how they were built and designed. So they’re actually doing exactly what they’re supposed to. They’re collecting any of the groundwater, and in this case I feel pretty confident in saying, if their sump pumps are running, it’s groundwater, because again, it’s a clay site. There’s also frost in the ground. So it’s really not coming from the rain, and it’s not entering through the ground. So it’s coming up from below. That’s, I mean, I can’t say, but I would say it’s a pretty. MRS. BRUNO-If it’s coming up from below, your systems should be able to handle it, if that’s all that it were. MR. WILSON-Exactly. It’s going into the pipes. It’s going in to their pit, and then if it’s not gravity, if we don’t have a gravity pipe, in other words, if it isn’t sloped back to that stormwater area, then there’s only one other way to do that, and that’s to put a sump pump in. We do it in 85 to 90% of our homes, standard construction. We don’t always have an opportunity to put it into a catch basin like Queensbury. They don’t allow storms to go into the storm system. So we have to provide an alternate means to distribute this water. So to answer the question that everybody’s asking about, a lot of the units that back up to this property and go all the way up around, those four inch pipes run out to the back of the properties. On the inner circle, there was a pipe that was designed, and what it does is it pumps to that pipe. That pipe goes down to the catch basin, crosses underneath the street, and then enters into the wetland area. So that is where all the water is going, and it’s coming from those areas. MRS. BRUNO-So we have a direct point drainage to the wetland area from basically everywhere goes into one pipe that goes into the wetland? MR. WILSON-On the inner circle, you know, on the Meadowbrook side, because obviously they back up to Meadowbrook. We couldn’t throw the water out onto Meadowbrook. So that’s why you drive down Meadowbrook, I think what you’ll see, other than maybe a small area where there was natural trees at one point that were left I think that have been since taken down, we don’t really have the water that gathers along Waverly Place out by the street anywhere near, I think, that you see further down, because I’d like to think the area there is really shedding less water than it probably did naturally back then, and the rest of the water is being collected and put towards the back, which was part of the original design. Back to your original question, I don’t know the exact elevation of the units on that thing. I think Jim is close in saying that they were in a relative, you know, similar situation, whether it’s 310, 311, somewhere in there. Really the big difference is. MRS. BRUNO-For the first floor finished grade. 28 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. WILSON-Correct, but the big difference is you have an eight foot wall, and then an eight inch footing, and the pipes sit on either side of the footing. The houses sit out about 20, 24 inches. So you’re still close to seven feet below where these pipes are actually picking up the water, but if that water is going into those pipes, into the sump pumps and going out, it’s working exactly the way we planned. MR. FORD-And if there’s any water accumulating on that floor, then it’s not. MR. WILSON-If there’s water, I would have been called. Believe me, I mean, I can attest to that. We get, I mean, the house could be 10 years old, and we would still get a call and if it’s a basement leak, we’d go out and look at it. MR. SEGULJIC-My problem is still you’re not giving those wetlands any breathing room. Is there any way you could move that slope back some? MR. MILLER-How far? MR. SEGULJIC-Fifty feet. For a couple of reasons I say that. Because in our Code it says you can’t have more than 16 inch retaining walls along a wetland area. You probably technically don’t exceed that. Another thing is, I don’t see how you’re going to fit your stormwater control measures in there during construction if you’re building right up to the wetland. You’ve got to be spot on. MR. MILLER-What we’ve done, there’s actually a different drawing that addresses, the sediment erosion control plan you can see addresses the runoff during construction, and what we’ve basically done here, the big concern, this is our staging area. All of our water here, we’re going to have, you know, we’ve put our construction entrance, but part of this area near the parking lot would collect water from the parking area, as well as some of this area in the back. So we have like a construction staging where we have actually increased amounts of a collection, because our concern during construction is collect silt. So what this does, by having these two basins, any runoff from our site collects there. The water’s allowed to sit there and any silt’s allowed to settle out, and at this point, we don’t have a drain out. We have basically it’s a stone filter, it allows the water to filter through, but the idea is to trap that sediment. So what happens during the construction, this has to be monitored, and when that sediment starts to collect and build up, it has to be removed to make sure that that basin is functioning and collecting the runoff from the construction site prior to being released. MR. SEGULJIC-I understand. I think the stormwater management plan would work great, but my problem is, you’re building right up to the edge of the wetland. There’s not even an inch difference, according to your plan. I don’t understand how you can do that. You’re not allowing your wetland any breathing room, and our Code says no filling or hard surfacing shall be permitted within 50 feet of any lake, pond, river, stream or wetland except by site plan approval. I mean, there’s got to be a reason why they say that. MR. MILLER-But I believe that refers to the DEC wetland. MR. SEGULJIC-I will go on further to read. Any DEC wetland or any other government agency having jurisdiction, which I believe the Army Corps would. So then it includes that wetland. MR. MILLER-The Army Corps doesn’t require any buffering, and that’s why there’s such a difference between DEC’s and the Army Corps, is the Army Corps is obviously a lot more stringent. So DEC, they cover theirs by doing a buffer, which is back into this area, and the Army Corps requires no buffer, because it’s a less inundated type of a wetland. MR. SEGULJIC-There are two issues here. One is the stormwater on the site, which I think you have a handle on. You’ve handled it. That’s fine. The other issue is what’s the impact outside of the area, which you build right up to the wetland. You’re not, the shock absorber, the wetland now is gone, and that’s going to have downstream implications. MR. MILLER-Well, what we’re doing is, you know, you take the wetland elevation, say it’s elevation 303, and then the slope goes from that 303 up to 310, and it goes up at an angle. It floods down at 302, 303. It’s not flooding up at 305. The flood, the water is down at that lower elevation. So what we’re doing is we’re basically increasing that slope. We’re not changing the water course. We’re not filling an area that floods. We’re basically just increasing that slope, you know, that comes back on the upland to construct the project. 29 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-If you were to reduce the fill on the site, I would think you could then bring back your wall somewhat and allow that wetland area some breathing room. MR. MILLER-But it doesn’t come beyond where we are. It doesn’t come back into here. MRS. BRUNO-What happens, though, when you increase the slope is the volume of water that would normally be spread out. MR. MILLER-That doesn’t happen because now it’s draining from here. It’s sheeting all the way out. So what happens is part of this construction. MRS. BRUNO-I’m not even talking about the water that would be sheeting out. I’m just talking specifically about the wetland. You’re saying that right now we’ve got water at 303 and you’ve got a slope like this, and I think what Tom is saying is that when you build, put the building in, you bring the slope up to here, you’ve got that triangular space times your distance and making a volume, which then, because there isn’t any fluctuation, it’s forcing it the other way, which happens to be where these folks live, and if kind of our loose calculations about where their basements are, they’re right about at where the ground level, 303 or so, is in this wetland. So we are, more or less, forcing the water. MR. MILLER-I hear what you’re saying, but, because what happens is the wetland floods up to this point now. So, you know, we’re not changing that. I mean, that’s where it comes, it fills up. MR. SEGULJIC-Excuse me. Wetlands don’t fluctuate? MR. MILLER-They do, but an Army Corps wetland, you know, to qualify for an Army Corps wetland, it only has to be inundated two weeks of the year, and the rest of the time it can be dry. So what happens, during rains like we’ve had, especially in Spring conditions now where everything’s frozen, the water is coming all up into here, and that’s what it’s meant to do. It’s functioning the way it should, and it’s not coming up beyond that, and, you know, sure, you could get some freak storm and it might come up beyond that, but I mean, then we’re going to have bigger problems than this, but what happens, what Tanya was saying, is that, you know, you’re right. If we just increased that slope and we had the same area, we would have a lot more velocity, but that’s not what’s happening in this. We’re basically flattening this area and we’re putting stormwater in that’s collecting the water off the roof so basically the area that drains off into that wetland is greatly reduced. So the runoff into that wetland is reduced. Now the water is taken from, you know, part of the site where it’s now coming off the back, and it’s coming in to the basin. So we’re reconfiguring that drainage area. What we try to do on a plan like this is to try to get that water and collect it into the basin where we can manage it. MR. SEGULJIC-Once again, there is no problem with the stormwater management on site. MRS. BRUNO-Not on site. MR. SEGULJIC-My concern is shall we say the improper stormwater managements upstream that counted on this area for the extra capacity to prevent other issues that you are now taking away. MR. MILLER-I don’t think we’re taking anything away. I mean, we’re not affecting the wetland. MR. WILSON-Maybe another way of explaining it, you have the site now with no construction on it, with a certain runoff situation. You have your site plan with your stormwater management system installed, and you have designed a system that appears to handle that runoff in a way that minimizes that alteration. I think where the question and the concern is is we currently have, if you forget about the stormwater management side of it for a minute, think of the wetlands in that area as a system, which currently has a, let’s call it a high spot where this construction site is located. Okay. Now how the wetlands in total interacts with the topography of that area and the hydraulics of how the wetlands changes its water level elevation, according to the ebb and flow of weather patterns and so on. With the current site, now insert your site plan. The concern is that having the, moving from the current topography of that’s there, with no development, to your site plan, forgetting about the management of the runoff, but 30 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) thinking of how your site plan, inserted into that wetland, how that’s now going to interact, that’s what I think the concern is, if I’m understanding the other Planning Board. MR. MILLER-Yes, I think I understand, but I think that, I mean, you’ve got to view this wetland like you’d view a pond or a lake. I mean, the water level rises, and it comes up to a certain elevation, and, you know, that’s it’s highest mark, and that’s what we’ve got in here. That’s what our flagged wetland boundary represents. That’s the high water mark, and so what we’re doing is above that. it’s no different than if you’re building along the side of a lake. You’re up above the high water mark. You’re changing the topography, but you’re not changing, you know, the hydraulics or the area of where that high water flows into, and that’s what we’ve tried to do. We’re changing the topography, but, you know, we’re not down at those lower elevations where we’re impacting that wetland. MR. TRAVER-So, your representation is then, for example, another way of stating that is that if we take a look at the hydrology of the footprint of that piece of property that’s outlined there, that roughly triangular site, and we consider or we were somehow able to calculate the total volume of water, as the site is currently configured, within that roughly triangular piece of property, what your representation to this Board is that following the construction of this project, as represented on your site plan, that volume will not change, will not be decreased? MR. MILLER-That’s correct. MR. SEGULJIC-You’d make me happy if you could push it back from the wetland. You could take your parking area, draw that down a little, you could expand that out a little to the north, you could pull it back a little, get rid of that neck area. MR. MILLER-Your concern is this piece of wetland here? I mean, because this is a major flow of water through here. MR. SEGULJIC-Exactly. It’s a major flow of water that you’re not allowing any breathing. If you pull it back a little, you give it a little room to expand and breath over time. MR. MILLER-Yes, but that water when it flows, it flows like this, and then what it does, it breathes out into that area that’s a wetland. I mean, that wetland, I mean, it’s a pond when he took these pictures, absolutely right, but, you know, you go out there, a month from now, it’s grass, and that’s, the wetland is the breathing area. The water floods up into that. I mean, it doesn’t go out beyond that. MR. SEGULJIC-So you can’t, you’re not budging at all with that? MR. MILLER-Well, my concern is quite honestly, what we’ve tried to do is maximize the usable area. That’s what we’ve tried to do, maximize what we can. I mean, if we come in here, I mean, 50 feet, we don’t have a project. MR. SEGULJIC-We don’t need 50 feet. MR. MILLER-But I don’t think five feet is going to make you happy, and I think this site is not that big that, you know, we have a lot of flexibility. I think, you know, 20 feet probably reduces down to where I don’t even know if we’d have a project anymore. MR. SEGULJIC-I mean, if you could try and push the parking lot further to the west, get rid of the neck, expand it out to the north, you could hold your, shall I call it the slope, the retaining wall. You’re going to be, you’d have to be spot on. That slope goes right up to that wetland there, right next to the retention basin. MR. MILLER-We’re back a little bit. We’re probably back about five feet. MR. SEGULJIC-No, I’m talking up on the other area, to the northwest, right there, and then down in there. You’re spot on to these wetlands. MR. MILLER-Well, what that is, I mean, that’s very similar to what was constructed here. What we’ve done is we’ve constructed a berm along here. So, I mean, you’ve got the wetland, and we’ve got an earth berm that separates our basin from the wetland, and it’s exactly what’s at Waverly Place here now. This area was excavated out and a berm was created here where you see the culvert. A berm was created to separate that wetland, or that storm basin from the wetland, and that’s exactly what we’re doing. We’re doing the same thing as what was done on the other side. 31 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. FORD-Will that berm, that you were just pointing to there, not put additional pressure on that berm that would be on the Waverly site? MR. MILLER-No, because they’re independent. What’s happening, this berm here is collecting the water that comes off of the Waverly Place roads and things and comes into that area, and then this berm, you know, I mean, these areas naturally drained into that wetland. So their stormwater basin’s collecting the water and controlling it as it’s released to the wetland. We’re basically doing the same thing on a much smaller scale, on this side. Both of these sites drain that way, and all these basins are doing is taking that water and then releasing it gradually into that wetland. MS. ALTER-How much of your land is disturbed? MR. MILLER-It was under an acre. MS. ALTER-So it’s over the 5,000 square feet that says we have the right to remediate? MR. MILLER-Yes, and we have, and that’s what we’ve done. We’re about 42,000 square feet. MS. ALTER-Okay. So you’re just under an acre. MR. MILLER-Yes. MS. ALTER-But when there’s an existing flooding problem, you know, we have to look at what we have before us, and, you know, it’s not a good planning principle not to have a buffer from the wetland, and certainly to have a retaining wall that’s right on the edge is very poor for the wetland. We all know that. MR. MILLER-We don’t have a retaining wall. We’ve got a slope that comes up there. MS. ALTER-You have a berm. MR. MILLER-It’s a grass slope, right. MS. ALTER-But still, as Tom pointed out, you’re not allowing the wetland any room to expand and contract, which is what wetlands do. That’s the reason that most towns have a Code that’s the 100 foot buffer. MR. MILLER-But the 100 foot buffer is to DEC, which is way out by the stream. MS. ALTER-No. Some communities have enacted a 100 foot buffer. MR. SEGULJIC-And for argument’s sake we could say 50 feet because whenever you go over 50 feet of the wetland, you have to have site plan approval. Fifty feet came from somewhere. I’m not a wetland expert. MR. MILLER-Well, that says we have site plan approval, I mean, that’s why we’re here. MR. SEGULJIC-And someone in their infinite wisdom said if you’re within 50 feet of a wetland, it’s an issue. We have to think about it. MR. MILLER-We have to look at it, right. MR. SEGULJIC-And that’s what I’m saying. I don’t like the fact that you’re spot on the wetland. Pull it back. MR. MILLER-I’m concerned we don’t have a project if we do that. MR. SEGULJIC-That’s the only issue I have with this. MR. FORD-I believe that it will impact that wetland, being that close to it, and it will impact it negatively. MR. HUNSINGER-I guess one of the thoughts that I had, before the most recent comments, was to, we seem to be stuck on the wetland issue and stormwater management issue, was to suggest that we have the Town Engineer here for the benefit of his experience and comment as we review this. 32 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. MILLER-Well, he’s reviewed it and signed off. MR. HUNSINGER-I understand that, but we didn’t ask him questions and there was no give and take and question and answer. MS. ALTER-You only did a 50 year storm. We have a right to ask you for a 100 year storm, and I think maybe the Board might want to think about asking for that. MR. SEGULJIC-What I see is a lot of times people don’t look, people just look at the site, not the surrounding area. As I read to you, I spoke to Mr. Ryan about this. He said that based on the review it does not appear this will have little or no impact on localized flooding or any pre-development. I’m just curious as to what localized flooding is, and I should have fleshed that out more when I spoke to him. MR. MILLER-Well, I’m sure he’s referring to the flooding that occurs in the vicinity of this project. I mean, he’s probably not referring to, say, flooding that may happen further down. MR. SEGULJIC-I’d like to have him tell me that. MR. MILLER-Okay. MRS. BRUNO-We could propose one thing to the client. Just according to what you showed us with the sign, you know, they’re kind of expecting, perhaps, three tenants move in. What if we were to two-thirds of the size of the project? You would also then get rid of some of the parking spaces because of the change in size and overall you’d be reducing the size of the project by about 2500 square feet. That’s building and parking spaces, give or take, which would then be able to bring you back. MR. MILLER-We’re saying two-thirds. So it would be 4500 square feet instead of 6,000. Is that two-thirds or is that three-quarters? MRS. BRUNO-No, it would be 4,000 square feet. MR. MILLER-I can’t answer that. MR. WILSON-I would probably say our contract will go away. We currently have a contract to build this building. Obviously, depending on this approval. MRS. BRUNO-A contract with a potential client? MR. WILSON-With the owner of the building, somebody that would own the building. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. MR. WILSON-We wouldn’t own the building. We’re going to look to build it for an owner. MRS. BRUNO-And then they’re going to sublet it? MR. WILSON-They will sublet it. So I would say if we reduce it by two-thirds, they’re going to walk. MR. SEGULJIC-I’m just uncomfortable with building right up to a wetland. We’re having issues out there, and it’s an incremental problem. If we allow this to continue, and I don’t mean to pick on this project, but what’s happened is it’s just become bigger and bigger and more highlighted. MR. TRAVER-Yes. It really sounds like it’s an issue of the context of this plan within the. MS. ALTER-The watershed. MR. TRAVER-Yes, well, yes. Within this section of the watershed, and perhaps it would benefit us to have some expertise that can specifically address the hydrology and the impact of the context of this project within the hydrology of that area. MR. HUNSINGER-Do members feel that having the Town Engineer here would be useful? I mean, is it worth considering tabling this to an April meeting? 33 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-Yes. I think so, and having the applicant, you know, look at pulling back. MR. TRAVER-If that’s an area that the Town Engineer can address. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, again, it was pointed out, the Town Engineer did sign off on the stormwater management, but we also didn’t have a dialogue and discussion with them as we’ve just had with the applicant. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, remember, he signed off on stormwater management, which I don’t think anyone has a problem with. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. Okay. MR. SEGULJIC-I’m concerned about, we’re building a barrier for that wetland area. What’s that going to do? MR. TRAVER-Yes, it’s an issue of context, I think. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. FORD-And if we look at this plan, forgetting, except as it can be applied to other wetlands in the Town of Queensbury. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, I’ve made some mistakes in the past. MR. FORD-Well, you know, if this is going to be the standard, then I think we’re trying to tread across a wetland ourselves, and I don’t think it’s going to be pretty. MRS. BRUNO-Can we address the other points that were made? Because I wasn’t here for the other meeting. I’d like to hear the architectural points. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, I think the applicant already summarized them. I guess I would just open it up for questions or comments from the Board, or did you mean some of the comments from the public regarding the architecture? MRS. BRUNO-No. I guess perhaps I so was so focused on the wetland issue that I blurred over some of your description of the architectural changes. I remember you said something about the roofline, and I do see that from the previous proposal. MR. MILLER-Yes. We reduced the roofline. We extended the stone at the lower level of the building around to the south side, and one of the neighbors commented about extending the landscaping. We certainly could do that, and then the third item was that the east elevation that faced Meadowbrook, there was a concern that it looked too much like the side of the building. So that elevation was re-worked, to make it have more of a presence. So those were the items, and one of the things we talked about last month, too, is there was some discussion about the gables and things one of the things with an elevation, you’re looking at kind of a distorted flat elevation. We’ve got an “L” shaped building. So that building has really got more movement to it, front and back, than it shows in the elevation. So I think that, you know, in the elevation, where the elevations where there’s a long elevation, they’ve got roof elements that break that up, but the area where it looks like there’s a lot of roof, there’s really, it’s “L” shaped, so it is broken up. MRS. BRUNO-That’s right. Thank you. You refreshed my memory again. MR. MILLER-You’re welcome. MR. FORD-I have an additional question. You basically have, I don’t know, for lack of a better term, a drip line around the structure. MR. MILLER-An eaves trench, yes. MR. FORD-The eaves trench, but there’s a concrete pad and no trench around that. Can you explain why? MR. MILLER-Typically what we do in a situation like that, the stone trench is extended underneath the pad, and the intent of that drip edge is to collect the roof water into that stone trench, so we don’t have mud splashing up. 34 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. FORD-Right. MR. MILLER-And then basically, and it’s deep and we made it wider, so that it actually collects that roof water and stores it and acts as a detention, and this area in here, you know, there would be fill placed there so, you know, we would have a controlled material there which would be a sandier material. MR. FORD-I understand that, but where the, right there. MR. MILLER-Right here, yes. MR. FORD-There’s none around that, and I’m wondering, what is that, and why isn’t there any stone around it? MR. MILLER-Well, that’s a rear door. That’s the secondary exit out, and we actually thought that this area would be a little lawn area out here, it was a nice, probably put a little table out there. It would be a nice place to go out for a lunch break or something on a nice day. So that’s just a pad that goes out onto a grass area there. I mean, we could extend that around, but typically what we do, we’re collecting the roof water. That stone usually runs all the way around the footing, so it runs underneath that pad. That pads poured above it. MR. HUNSINGER-I thought you did a good job of addressing the Board’s comments and concerns on the design. MR. MILLER-Not good enough. MR. HUNSINGER-No. I thought you did a good job. MR. SEGULJIC-I think it’s a great project, other than let the wetland breath. MRS. BRUNO-We put you through your paces. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other comments or concerns on anything other than stormwater? Any other comments or questions from the Board? MR. SEGULJIC-I’m all set. MR. FORD-No. MRS. BRUNO-I think I’m all set. MR. HUNSINGER-Would anyone like to put forward a tabling resolution? Do we need to make any special accommodations to have the Town Engineer here for a meeting, just other than to request? MRS. BARDEN-No, you can just request that he’s in attendance at whatever meeting, and I know that he’s available for those. MR. HUNSINGER-I guess, going along with Mr. Seguljic’s comments, I mean, certainly if the applicant wants to revise the plan, based on some of the comments that you’ve heard, I mean, you certainly can do that. There was a letter that the Executive Director of the Town sent out to at least three concerned property owners in Waverly Place, th saying that this project would be heard on April 17. She, for whatever reason thought, it was her mistake. She was thinking the hearing was going to be then and not this evening. So I think in light of that, I’d like to table this to that date. MR. MILLER-And you would have the Town’s Engineer? MR. HUNSINGER-We would have the Town Engineer here, and we would have an additional discussion on stormwater, as well as the flooding in the neighborhood. MR. SEGULJIC-As far as making a motion, should we review providing a buffer along the wetland and then have the Town Engineer appear to address stormwater issues? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. 35 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-Yes. I think that’s all we really need to say, but I guess I’m sort of th asking the applicant if they would like it postponed to another date, rather than the 17 of April? th MR. MILLER-I would say, if we’re going to table, and we table until the 17, and then, you know, obviously we have to go back and discuss this with the applicants, and, you know, if we’re going to revise a plan, we may ask to be postponed later, but they may opt th to just come back on the 17 and have a discussion with the engineer. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. So, for the benefit of the public, well, I’ll wait until any motion is offered. th MR. SEGULJIC-So we’re going to table it to April 17? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 2-2007 THE MICHAELS GROUP, Introduced by Thomas Seguljic who moved for its adoption, seconded by Thomas Ford: th Tabled to April 17, for the following: 1.Applicant review of providing a buffer along the wetland. 2.Having the Town Engineer present to discuss wetland issues at that time. th Duly adopted this 27 day of March, 2007, by the following vote: MRS. BRUNO-I would just like to request from Staff, at some point when you have a little bit of time, perhaps if we could pull the as builts from the Waverly Place, just as a point of reference. MR. FORD-Yes. Thank you. MRS. BRUNO-You’re welcome. MRS. BARDEN-Any new information needs to be in by when? MR. HUNSINGER-Well, we haven’t really asked for new information from the applicant. MRS. BARDEN-So the revisions for the buffer along the wetland is just a consideration? MR. SEGULJIC-Correct. Yes. I said review, right, that’s how I was interpreting that. I’d like to have them do that, if they would. MR. FORD-If they can come up with something. MR. HUNSINGER-And if the applicant would want to postpone that, we certainly can do that to a future meeting. MRS. BARDEN-Okay. MR. MILLER-I think if we agreed to, if we decide to do some re-design, that’s what we probably would opt to do, but we obviously have to think this out. MR. SEGULJIC-Because, once again, it’s a great project, other than bring it back a little. MR. MILLER-There’s always a catch. All our sites are either too steep or too wet. All the good ones are gone. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. AYES: Mr. Traver, Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Ford, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp 36 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-Just for benefit of the public, we did leave the public hearing open. th This project will be heard again on April 17. There will be time at that meeting for additional comments from the public, and I appreciate your patience on this. SITE PLAN NO. 3-2007 SEQR TYPE UNLISTED VANCE COHEN AGENT(S) RON MOGREN SARATOGA ASSOCIATES OWNER(S) DR. MITCHELL COHEN ZONING HC-INT. LOCATION 1159-1161 STATE ROUTE 9 APPLICANT PROPOSES AN 18,000 SQ. FT. PUBLIC PARKING FACILITY. PARKING FACILITIES IN THE HC ZONE REQUIRE SITE PLAN REVIEW BY THE PLANNING BOARD. THE PLANNING BOARD MAY CONDUCT SEQR REVIEW. CROSS REFERENCE AV 7-2007 WARREN CO. PLANNING 2/14/07 OTHER FLOOD ZONE X LOT SIZE 0.57 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 295.8-1-2 SECTION 179-4-020 RON MOGREN, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT; V. COHEN, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Susan, if you could summarize Staff Notes, please. MRS. BARDEN-The applicant seeks site plan review to remove the 2,149 square foot building, Shindigs, and construct an 18,000 square foot public parking facility. The existing 456 square foot ice cream stand will remain. An Area Variance from the minimum permeability requirement of 30% for the Highway Commercial Intensive zone is st pending. At the February 21 Zoning Board meeting, the ZBA determined the request an Unlisted Action under SEQRA and requested that a coordinated review be lead by the Planning Board. Concerns regarding the variance request as voiced by the Board included review of the proposed stormwater management plan by the Planning Board and the Town Engineer. The Board, if prepared, should accept Lead Agency status and commence SEQRA. The Warren County Planning Board’s recommendation at their th March 14 meeting was to deny without prejudice. Finally, Vision Engineering submitted rd a project review letter dated February 23 for this project. MR. SEGULJIC-Mr. Chairman, if I could just get, the application was denied, deny without prejudice? What exactly does that mean? MRS. BARDEN-That is in your. MR. SEGULJIC-I see that, but what does that mean? MRS. BARDEN-It means that to approve this, the Board would need a super majority. MR. SEGULJIC-But what exactly is the County saying, that they don’t like the project? MRS. BARDEN-They are, I think pretty much spelled out areas of concern for you to address. MR. HUNSINGER-Good evening. MR. MOGREN-Hi. Ron Mogren from Saratoga Associates. This is Vance Cohen. I’d just like to summarize what we did since we met the last time. MR. HUNSINGER-Sure. MR. MOGREN-We’ve addressed the, you know, revised and re-submitted the plans to address the engineer’s comments. We’ve added a little, some stormwater quality treatment in that. As a result of one of his comments about the lighting plan, I’ve submitted what I refer to as an alternate lighting plan. The first one he had some comments about high foot candles and a couple of other things. So we’ve submitted another site lighting plan to hopefully address those comments, and really what we did there was we just raised the pole heights up a little bit to ease off on some of the foot candles. I think he said the foot candles were kind of high there. So, that’s what we’ve done since the last meeting, and I’ll just open it up for some questions and discussion, I guess. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Comments or questions from the Board? MR. SEGULJIC-To start off with the first one. Have you checked with the County? Have you confirmed with the DOT that parking, landscaping, signage, are allowed on the DOT land? Are you aware of that comment? MR. MOGREN-I’m not aware of that. Where did that comment come from? 37 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-It came from the County. MR. MOGREN-I haven’t seen anything from the. MRS. BARDEN-Warren County Planning Board. Do you have the resolution? MR. MOGREN-No, I haven’t seen anything from that meeting. We were going to submit to the, we planned on submitting to DOT as soon as we get some kind of resolution here. I didn’t see why submitting, you know, the plans may be revised. So we haven’t submitted anything to the DOT yet, but we plan on doing that. MRS. BARDEN-Would you like the resolution? MR. HUNSINGER-Did you have anything else, Tom? MR. SEGULJIC-That’s it. MRS. BRUNO-I have a question. Perhaps I could have answered it myself if I had gone through things a little bit more closely, but when you went to the ZBA, what percentage did you ask for in relief from the permeability requirement? It was required that you had 30%, and you must have asked for. MR. MOGREN-Yes, just about five percent or so. I think it amounts to about 10 parking spaces or so in square footage, and again, you know, with the fence, it just seems, we’re asking for that relief because what The Great Escape did by putting their fence up to the north, and, you know, that green space there that slopes down, you know, Vance is required to maintain, you know, they don’t maintain that, so Vance is mowing these properties, close to the DOT right of way and the little strip of land between the fence on the north side and all that water is pitching into our site. We’ve provided storm chambers for the stormwater management from those areas, and I just, you know, we just think that if we’ve got to provide the stormwater management, we have to mow and maintain those areas, then why can’t we, you know, maybe use them a little bit to help us in our calculation for impervious area, which is the gist of the variance right there. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Anything else? Well, if there’s no other questions or comments from the Board, I will open the public hearing. Is there anyone here that had questions or comments on this application? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MR. HUNSINGER-I will leave the public hearing open for the time being. What’s the will of the Board? MRS. BRUNO-Are you going to be renting out the ice cream building to someone? MR. COHEN-Yes, we are. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. Do you have any idea now who that might be? MR. COHEN-We do have a tenant currently that we just recently signed a lease. MR. HUNSINGER-I think all we’re really doing tonight is seeking Lead Agency status for the SEQRA review. MRS. BARDEN-You already sought it. Now you need to accept it, and go ahead and proceed with it. MR. HUNSINGER-I’m sorry, yes, because then it goes back to the Zoning Board. MR. SEGULJIC-So really we shouldn’t spend a lot of time on site plan issues. MR. HUNSINGER-Right, we can deal with them during site plan review. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. 38 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-But we need to take them into consideration with respect to SEQRA, yes. MR. SEGULJIC-Are we doing SEQRA tonight? MR. HUNSINGER-Potentially, yes. Right, Susan? MRS. BARDEN-I’m sorry? MR. HUNSINGER-If we’re ready to do SEQRA tonight. MRS. BARDEN-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-We have to do SEQRA before it goes back to the Zoning Board. MRS. BARDEN-That’s right. It’s a coordinated review. MR. SEGULJIC-So tonight, assuming we do SEQRA, then it goes to the Zoning Board. They grant the variance, assume they variance, it comes back to us. MR. HUNSINGER-For site plan review. MRS. BARDEN-That’s right. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MRS. BARDEN-And if you could even give them a recommendation, that would be even better. MR. FORD-So SEQRA would not take into consideration, we’re not going to address these site plan issues? MR. HUNSINGER-Well, I mean, we can certainly ask any questions of the applicant related to the site plan, because we do need to take into consideration site plan issues in reviewing SEQRA. MRS. BRUNO-Right. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, but we’re not reviewing the site plan itself tonight. MR. FORD-Can we address the lighting issues then? MR. SEGULJIC-Certainly. MR. FORD-Okay. MR. MOGREN-You’re referring to the issues from the Staff? MR. FORD-Staff Notes. MR. MOGREN-Yes. As I had mentioned, there was a, with the last submittal, there was an alternate lighting plan submitted, and they’re referring here to I think the 18, let me see, site lighting, okay. The average is 3.2. On the ultimate plan, we raised the poles a little bit and you can check that, and we did lower the foot candles. They had a question about the calcs on Two, and that’s just how that plan was labeled, the whole site is just, there’s just one zone, and that’s the whole site there. So there’s a statistical chart in the upper left hand corner, and if you’ve got the lighting plan that says the alternate plan down there, right down in the middle of the bottom page there. MR. SEGULJIC-Date 7/5/2006? It doesn’t say alternate. MR. MOGREN-The alternate plan just has a note right here, just alternate. MRS. BRUNO-No. MR. MOGREN-Okay. So you’ve got the, there were, this was submitted with the revised drawings, but what’s going on with this one now is that the average foot candles is 2.3 with a max of 6.4 and a minimum of .3, and the average over minimum is 7.7 to 1. So all 39 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) those were improved. The Town Engineer had some comments on the lighting plan the last time, which drew me to revise this and re-submit this, but unfortunately I guess you didn’t get a copy of this. MR. FORD-Right. th MR. TRAVER-The one we have is from December 5. MR. MOGREN-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-You said you raised the lights in height? MR. MOGREN-Yes, we raised the pole fixtures to, from an 18 foot height to a 23 foot height, 23 and a half foot, and we’re a little challenged with the horizontal locations, these light poles given the location of the perimeter retaining wall. So we’re kind of just, you know, trying to deal with the lighting in these areas, and that was what the lighting consultant came up with. MR. FORD-You didn’t modify the foot candle output? You just raised the pole? MR. MOGREN-Yes. MR. FORD-By how many feet? MR. MOGREN-From 18 to 23. MR. FORD-Five feet. So we’re over 20. MR. SEGULJIC-Excuse me, Mr. Chairman. So if we approve SEQRA tonight, let’s say for example, I don’t know how many spots are out here, there’s, what? MR. MOGREN-Fifty-three. MR. SEGULJIC-Fifty-three. Can we then tweak down, for example, tweak down the number of spots, or if we approve SEQRA and we’re stuck with the 53 for example? I’m just trying to understand the process. MRS. BARDEN-No, you can tweak it. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, we can change it. MS. ALTER-You can go down, just not up. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MRS. BRUNO-Just to bring it up, the Staff Notes do mention that the proposed does not meet interior or exterior parking lot landscaping requirements. Is that something that you could address before the next? MR. MOGREN-Well, again, that’s the basis of the variance is the interior, I believe it’s the interior green space is what the, now the Staff comment about the, you know, all the comments about the landscaping and the green space, you know, again, we’re just trying to look for a little relief and utilize some of the green space that surrounds this site that’s been basically cast off from The Great Escape, in terms of maintenance and stormwater management. So I know we’re a little light on those things. MRS. BRUNO-I understand what you’re saying, in terms of, you know, if you’ve got to give up green space then obviously you’re giving up the interior, potential for interior landscaping. Just kind of take a quick look and see if maybe we can increase, kind of flip flop it and put an increase maybe in the areas that you do have so that you have more dense, so the landscaping is more dense in those areas that you do have. Pretty much all of these trees are proposed. MR. MOGREN-That’s correct. You’re looking at the landscape plan? MRS. BRUNO-Yes. MR. MOGREN-Yes. Yes, I did this planting plan based on what I thought was the interpretation of your Code. I think some Staff may disagree with that, and maybe I 40 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) missed something and we need to add some more trees. I’m sure we can accommodate that. MRS. BRUNO-Well, between now and the next site plan, I’ll look at it more thoroughly, because as you can tell, I haven’t looked at it enough. MR. MOGREN-The only trees that are existing on the site are down on the bottom side where they’re right up against the property line with The Great Escape park. There’s some existing evergreens that we’re trying to maintain as best we can. Everything else is new plantings. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. MR. TRAVER-I have a question, getting back to the lighting plan again. Would you be able to take a look at, rather than raising the height of your light poles, perhaps reducing the output power of the lights that are there? And the reason I mention that is by raising them, you’re perhaps contributing to some skyline illumination and some spillage to adjacent areas, and I understand that there’s a lot of, in the context of this site, there’s a lot of illumination at night, but I think you can accomplish this same thing, perhaps even less, in a less costly manner, by simply changing perhaps a fixture, instead of putting a much larger. MR. MOGREN-Yes, the fixture we’re specifying here is 200 watts. So I’ll take a look at reducing the wattage of each fixture, and getting that down to, what is it, 20 feet, is that the Town requirement, the 20 foot height? MR. TRAVER-Well, I think in your original plan they were 18? MR. MOGREN-They were. MR. TRAVER-I would say, if possible, I mean, the ideal, I don’t know how other members feel, but if you can accommodate the requirements with the 18 foot, even as opposed to 20, by simply changing the fixtures, that would be even better, and I think more cost effective. MR. MOGREN-Well, I’m not sure how that’ll lay out, but I can certainly investigate that. MR. TRAVER-Thank you. MR. FORD-That’s where I was going with that questioning about the 23 feet. MR. SEGULJIC-Just to clarify, that is the Code. It says 20 feet. MR. MOGREN-Twenty foot height max? Okay. I missed that. I’m sorry. Of course you didn’t get the lighting plan anyway. Do you have a revision block on your plan, 3/09/07, site plans? MR. SEGULJIC-There’s a date of 12/15/06, if that’s what you’re asking. MR. MOGREN-Yes, and then right below it, one revision 3/09/07. MR. SEGULJIC-No. MR. MOGREN-See, they never got this first, my submittal. MR. FORD-We don’t even have that. MRS. BARDEN-I don’t have it either. MS. ALTER-When did you hand it in? MR. MOGREN-I handed it in on 3/09/07, and dropped it off to Pam and it was in response to the engineer’s comments. MR. TRAVER-So the site plan that we’re currently looking at is not? MR. FORD-So we don’t have the right site plan and we don’t have the right illumination schedule. 41 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. MOGREN-Yes. The site plan that I’m looking at, that you’re not, reflects a discussion with the Town Engineer and revisions to that Town Engineer. So that letter that you have, I believe I’ve taken care of that. I was hoping that I would have gotten another letter today saying he was signed off on it, but we don’t have it. I guess I don’t have that, but the revised plan should have been forwarded on to the engineer, I believe. MS. ALTER-I apologize. We’re inundated with plans because we had an extra meeting. It probably got under something. I know that isn’t the proper answer, but that’s probably what happened. It just got mixed up with another drawing. I’ll look into it tomorrow and call you. MR. MOGREN-Yes, because I can run you some more copies or you have them at the office. MS. ALTER-I’m sorry. MR. MOGREN-That’s all right. MR. HUNSINGER-They wouldn’t have gone to the Zoning Board, would they? MR. MOGREN-It’s a standard 15 copy submittal. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Well, in light of that, what’s the feeling of members here? I mean, we don’t even have the most up to date information. MR. FORD-Just table it until we get it. MRS. BRUNO-Does the ZBA have a meeting scheduled already? MR. HUNSINGER-It’s scheduled to go before them tomorrow night, right? Is it tomorrow night they go before the Zoning Board? MRS. BARDEN-No. MR. MOGREN-No, it’s in April. th MR. TRAVER-April 25, and they were asking for a recommendation. If we could get what we can before that. MR. MOGREN-Well, would you be willing to do SEQRA tonight? That’s really what the ZBA was really looking for a SEQRA determination. MRS. BRUNO-I think we’re hesitant just because we don’t have those updated plans. MR. MOGREN-What’s the regard with SEQRA, though? I can go over the changes with you. They were really just addressing stormwater management issues, and they weren’t very detailed. I volunteered up some water quality, one of his comments, one of his main comments was, you know, not doing any water quality treatment of the storm, which we’re not required to do because we’re less than an acre for DEC, but, you know, I’ve gone ahead and added an oil separator in the driveway to separate the oils from the vehicles in the car. So I, you know, went ahead and we did some water quality measures for him on that, but I can review the letter with you. The changes were very minor. As a matter of fact, let me just run down. Susan, have you got the copy of the letter that I wrote to you, on 3/9? Let me just review, can I review this letter? MR. HUNSINGER-Go ahead, yes. MR. MOGREN-This summarizes the changes to the plans, if you’re interested, but it’s about a 16 point letter regarding the engineer’s comments. Number One, a Long Form EAF had been previously submitted. The engineer wanted us to do a test pit on site, to determine where the depth to the groundwater is, and we’re going to do that as the weather permits. He questioned that the stormwater report wasn’t signed and sealed by a PE, which we did. There was some questions about a drywell that we originally had in there, and that’s where I substituted the drywell for the oil separator. The drywell doesn’t give you any water quality, but the oil separator does. So we did that. MR. HUNSINGER-Does the oil separator service the whole lot? MR. MOGREN-Yes. 42 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. MOGREN-Because, you know, again, this lot, the existing asphalt pavement on this lot was just installed just a couple of years ago. So we’re utilizing that, and we’re utilizing those drainage patterns, and that all comes down and pitches into the low area, which is what the oil separator will collect all that, and then as you’re aware probably, you know, that separates the oil, and then the rest of the water, the clean water goes into the storage chambers, the underground storage chambers which is the bulk of our stormwater management, those, we’ve got a number of stormwater chambers in there that will hold a 50 year storm. So we put a little water quality treatment in there for that. MR. FORD-And the oil goes where? MR. MOGREN-The oil has to be maintained, but the oil basically floats to the surface of this, it’s a pre-cast concrete box. The water pours in there. Oil floats to the surface, and then there’s a “T” in there that the “T” goes down to the lower end of that box so that the water that draws out of there is drawn from the bottom and not the top. So the oil would be floating on top and that needs to be maintained, as any structure, to clean out the oil. MR. HUNSINGER-So how often do you clean it out, once a season in this case? MR. MOGREN-Perhaps, yes. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. MOGREN-It’s not a huge volume there, but we do anticipate that the groundwater will be down there six feet or so, and that’s kind of a measure to clean that out before it gets to the groundwater. Okay. He had some questions about the ADA requirements about the five foot access aisles, and I pointed out to him that with ADA, the question was, the access aisles are, one was five foot and one was eight foot. ADA requires that only 25% of the access aisles has to be eight feet. So we’ve maintained one five and one eight. So we feel we comply with the ADA requirements, and one of the comments was about some additional asphalt, right at the, the plans that you have show, on the layout plan, a 24 foot 0 inch dimension from the island to the face of the building, and he had suggested that we give some extra room there. So I made that an extra three feet wide to give a little swing room along the building there. So we increased that to 27 feet. Oil separator, and again, not realizing that we were kind of utilizing existing drainage patterns, he had also, as your Staff did, come up with some ideas about how we could better pitch the parking lot for the bio retention that the Staff recommended, but again, we’re kind of holding on to the existing drainage patterns that were set by that asphalt that was put down. He thought that the erosion control was minimal, and it is because this site is as self-contained as any site can be, but we did put in some erosion control measures and really just a filter inlet around that oil separator that will further separate some sediments out, and again, he had a comment about the landscaping, too, and I still just kind of thought that I had complied with that, but again, I’m open to other landscape requirements, and then the last one was the ultimate lighting plan. So, I thought I’d get a head start on the engineer by doing this at the last meeting, unfortunately he didn’t get a hold of that, but that’s the gist of what the initial round of engineer’s comments were about. MR. FORD-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, that gives me a better sense for, you know, what the changes were. MR. SEGULJIC-Yes. I think we can go ahead with it. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MRS. BRUNO-Especially since it was partially on our end. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. SEGULJIC-I mean, we have him on record as to what the changes are. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. We do have a public hearing scheduled for this evening. I will open the public hearing. Is there anyone here that has comments for this application? Mr. Strough? Good evening. 43 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) JOHN STROUGH MR. STROUGH-Good evening. John Strough. Let me understand. Is this going to be supplementary parking for The Great Escape? MR. HUNSINGER-Basically, yes. MR. STROUGH-And this may be something you’ve already considered. I haven’t been a part of this, but I was a part of The Great Escape Environmental Impact study and Comprehensive Plan, and we forced them to put a pedestrian bridge over Route 9 to make it safer for pedestrians. We did not want any pedestrians crossing Route 9, none. That’s why we made them put up a fence, and forced the pedestrian bridge issue. So all pedestrians that have to cross Route 9 cross Route 9 using the pedestrian bridge, for the sake of public safety. Like I said, we eliminated both traffic lights, to enable the free flow of traffic through the area. So if this parking facility, we should hold them to the same standards, is what I’m suggesting. If we’re trying to eliminate pedestrians from crossing Route 9, is there some way that this person is going to fence their property off and direct traffic to the pedestrian bridge so that we hold them to the same standard that we held The Great Escape to. It may be something you’ve already considered, and if so, I apologize, but if you haven’t considered it, I think we have to hold everyone to the same standard. That’s my only comment, being part of the original plan with The Great Escape. Thank you. MR. STROUGH-Thank you. MRS. BRUNO-I have a question for you, and this is looking at the larger picture. Earlier this evening we had another proposed parking facility across the street, brought in front of us. When The Great Escape came in front of the Board, and the number of parking spaces were determined, Number One, did they go over and above what was initially calculated? Did they go for a variance for excessive parking spots? MR. STROUGH-When, The Great Escape’s full build out was a million and a half attendees in a season. It’s currently experiencing 700 to 800,000 attendees in the past couple of seasons. I don’t know if their parking lots have gotten to full build out at this time because we allowed them to do it in phases and I haven’t kept track of that, but they were allowed to do it in phases, and I don’t know at what phase they are at now. Yes, we figured enough parking to accommodate up to a million and a half attendees, which is double what they were when they came to us, which was approximately, 7, 750. Now it’s gotten up to about eight, but the attendance has not been what they had hoped it would be. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, I don’t think they’ve hit a million yet. MR. STROUGH-Yes. I think it’s you know, they’re going to be waiting a while before they see a million and a half, but, yes, there was enough parking to accommodate that. MRS. BRUNO-Perhaps someone on the Board could enlighten me. I remember right when I started last year on the Board that one of The Great Escape’s parking plans came in front of us, and I think it had more to do with the employees for the employees for the Lodge, but nonetheless, have they gone to full build out yet with their parking? MRS. BARDEN-Honestly, I don’t know. MR. HUNSINGER-I don’t think so, because I think there’s still parking lots, the more southern lots haven’t been fully constructed yet. MR. STROUGH-I think Chris is right. So they still have more construction there, and their original connector road, which is going to be completed in the next phase, probably when they expand the parking again and more so, it’s going to come out around where Martha’s is, where Round Pond Road is, and there’ll be a traffic light there, okay, and all the parking in front of Martha’s will move to the back of Martha’s, because right now we have conflicts with the pedestrians and the traffic flow, but that’s proposed to be eliminated with the next phase moving up towards old Animal Land. MRS. BRUNO-And we’ll be reviewing that again, right, as those come forward. So really, I’m just trying to balance in my mind, in terms of, you know, the adjacent landowners, their rights for their property, and looking at our Town as a whole, that we don’t want to have one big parking lot. I could see perhaps how Mr. Cohen could end up 44 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) putting in his parking lot and then that may end up adjusting The Great Escape’s need. I’m just putting all the puzzle pieces together and seeing how it falls out. MR. STROUGH-Well, and I certainly don’t want to deny Mr. Cohen his right to make gains, and make use of his property. My issue is public safety. MRS. BRUNO-I understand that. MR. STROUGH-Okay, and I’m just saying we should hold them to the same standard that we held The Great Escape to because public safety doesn’t make any difference if you’re this big guy or the small guy. It’s still important. MRS. BRUNO-Absolutely, and thank you for addressing my further questions. Put you on the spot there. MR. STROUGH-All right. Well, thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Anyone else? DON DANIELS MR. DANIELS-I’m Don Daniels, Queensbury. It would seem to me that if we’re going to direct every single person that crosses Route 9 in the entire Town of Queensbury to go to that bridge, then anybody that’s at the motel at the corner of Round Pond Road can’t cross the road to go to Martha’s. They have to go down to the bridge. Anybody at the Greycourt Motel that wants to go and play mini-golf has to go to the bridge. Last summer I saw people from The Great Escape lodge walk across Route 9 and go into The Great Escape. They didn’t use the bridge. All over the Outlets, they go back and forth, walking back and forth. There’s some crosswalks, but they’re what you might call jaywalking on both sides. Maybe we should make those Outlet stores direct everybody to the bridge. If the bridge is the only thing in the Town of Queensbury that people can cross Route 9, it seems pretty ridiculous. They’ve created quite a problem for Mr. Cohen, The Great Escape themselves, and some people would like to say, well, make Mr. Cohen force everybody to take the bridge. Well, the crosswalk was eliminated. The light was eliminated, so people can’t cross, but I was in The Great Escape last year, and when I came out, people were walking out the door, walking across, to go to Martha’s from The Great Escape when they came out at five o’clock and six o’clock and go to Martha’s going the other way. They didn’t take the bridge to go over to go to Martha’s. So, you have to be kind of fair here. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Anyone else? Okay. If there’s no other takers, I will close the public hearing. PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED MR. HUNSINGER-Is the Board comfortable moving forward on SEQRA? It is a Long Form. Do you have it? MRS. BARDEN-Mr. Chairman, you may just want to leave the public hearing open. You’re not going to finish this project tonight. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, this is just the public hearing for SEQRA, not for Site Plan Review. Right? MRS. BARDEN-Well, you can do it either way. You can keep it open for the duration of the project or you can close it now before you do SEQRA, but you don’t necessarily have to close the public hearing. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. I thought we had to close it before we could move forward on SEQRA. I will leave the public hearing open then. Thank you. PUBLIC HEARING RE-OPENED MS. ALTER-Was it the Board’s plan to adopt a neg dec tonight? MR. HUNSINGER-Well, I think the first resolution to consider is the resolution provided in our Staff package to Acknowledge Lead Agency Status. Would anyone like to put forward that resolution? 45 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-I thought we already did that? MR. HUNSINGER-We asked to be Lead Agency, but now what we’re doing is acknowledging. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. FORD-Thank you for that clarification. MOTION TO ACKNOWLEDGE LEAD AGENCY STATUS IN REGARD TO SITE PLAN NO. 3-2007, 35-2006 & AREA VARIANCE NO. 7-2007 VANCE COHEN, Introduced by Tanya Bruno who moved for its adoption, seconded by Stephen Traver: WHEREAS, in connection with the Vance Cohen project, the Town of Queensbury Planning Board, by resolution, previously authorized the Community Development office to notify other involved agencies of the desire of the Planning Board to conduct a coordinated SEQRA review, and WHEREAS, the Zoning Administrator has advised that other involved agencies have been notified and have consented to the Town of Queensbury Planning Board being lead agent, and NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, the Town of Queensbury Planning Board hereby recognizes itself as lead agent for purposes of SEQRA review according to the resolution prepared by Staff. th Duly adopted this 27 day of March, 2007, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Ford, Mr. Traver, Mr. Seguljic, Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. We want to start the SEQRA. MRS. BRUNO-“Will the proposed action result in a physical change to the project site?” MR. HUNSINGER-No. MR. SEGULJIC-I have a problem with that because one of the things it says construction on land where the depth to the water table is less than three feet. We don’t know what the water table is. MR. MOGREN-Less than three feet? It’s not that shallow. MR. SEGULJIC-Yes, but we don’t have any information to that effect. MR. FORD-We don’t know. MR. MOGREN-The only information right now is out of the soils books and everything that say it’s around six feet, but we’ll confirm that. MR. FORD-I’m not sure we’ve got enough information to proceed. I’m feeling uncomfortable with that. MR. SEGULJIC-I guess if we find out it is less than three feet, we can go back at it. Correct? MR. HUNSINGER-Well, I guess the question would be, even if it is less than three feet, what would be the impact? If we were putting in a house with a foundation and a cellar, then there would be a concern, but since it’s a parking lot, the only room that you really need is for stormwater management. There’s not going to be development within the. MR. SEGULJIC-All right. So you’re saying this project wouldn’t impact, the fact that it’s less than three feet wouldn’t impact this project anyway. MR. HUNSINGER-It wouldn’t necessarily impact it. 46 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-So I mean I think we can answer yes, and actually Tanya was making a comment, if you want to share that with the rest of the Board. I don’t know if you need to get your notes out, but, she was just saying how the training session that she went to at Saratoga County, they said that this answer should almost always be yes, because you are making physical changes to the property, but then, you know, we need to look at what’s the impact, you know, how large is it, and can it be mitigated? MRS. BRUNO-Right. MR. HUNSINGER-So, you know, it’s okay to say yes, and then qualify the answer by what we mean by yes. So we can answer this question as yes, especially since we don’t know definitive what the depth to groundwater is, but then we can say that the impact is small to moderate and any impacts can be mitigated through site plan review. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MRS. BRUNO-This was given at the Saratoga County Planning Board Third Annual Planning & Zoning Conference on January 24, 2007, and it was during an advanced SEQRA presentation, given by Theresa Backer of Whiteman, Austerman and Hanna. Perhaps more importantly also Betty Ann Hughes from New York State DEC, and that was just one comment that they made, that they see a lot of Boards doing and it’s almost always yes, there’s a change, and it’s as the Chairman pointed out, we’ve mitigated or not. MR. HUNSINGER-So is everyone comfortable with that answer? MR. SEGULJIC-So we’re going to say small to moderate and can be mitigated? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-Yes. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. RESOLUTION WHEN DETERMINATION OF NO SIGNIFICANCE IS MADE RESOLUTION NO. 3-2007, 35-2006 & AV 7-2007, Introduced by Tanya Bruno who moved for its adoption, seconded by Stephen Traver: WHEREAS, there is presently before the Planning Board an application for: VANCE COHEN, and WHEREAS, this Planning Board has determined that the proposed project and Planning Board action is subject to review under the State Environmental Quality Review Act, NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED: 1. No Federal agency appears to be involved. 2. The following agencies are involved: NONE 3. The proposed action considered by this Board is Unlisted in the Department of Environmental Conservation Regulations implementing the State Environmental Quality Review Act and the regulations of the Town of Queensbury. 4. An Environmental Assessment Form has been completed by the applicant. 5. Having considered and thoroughly analyzed the relevant areas of environmental concern and having considered the criteria for determining whether a project has a significant environmental impact as the same is set forth in Section 617.11 of the Official Compilation of Codes, Rules and Regulations for the State of New York, this Board finds that the action about to be undertaken by this Board will 47 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) have no significant environmental effect and the Chairman of the Planning Board is hereby authorized to execute and sign and file as may be necessary a statement of non-significance or a negative declaration that may be required by law. th Duly adopted this 27day of March, 2007, by the following vote: MRS. BRUNO-The impact on transportation, alteration of present patterns of movements of people and/or goods. That doesn’t necessarily say, I mean, transportation, does that include pedestrian transportation? Proposed action will result in major traffic problems, other impacts. MR. TRAVER-I would say that would more than likely fall under danger to a non- endangered species. MRS. BRUNO-Humans? MR. TRAVER-Humans. MR. HUNSINGER-So, yes or no? MRS. BRUNO-Okay. Yes. AYES: Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Ford, Mr. Traver, Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp MR. HUNSINGER-Step One’s done. MRS. BARDEN-A recommendation perhaps. MR. HUNSINGER-A recommendation. That might be a little more difficult since we don’t have the current plans. MRS. BARDEN-Well, that part of it hasn’t changed. Just permeability. MR. HUNSINGER-I’m sorry, what was your last comment, Susan? MRS. BARDEN-The Area Variance is for minimum permeability requirement. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Which can be handled through site plan review. It can mitigate it. MR. SEGULJIC-What exactly are they asking for? MRS. BRUNO-Looks like five percent. MR. MOGREN-Five percent of the impervious area. Required is 30, and we have 25%, and all that green space surrounding the site that we have to mow and drain and all that. MR. SEGULJIC-Green space is nice, though. MR. MOGREN-We like that. MRS. BRUNO-But it’s not owned by Mr. Cohen. It’s owned by The Great Escape, right? MR. MOGREN-That’s correct. MRS. BRUNO-That’s your point. So you’re kind of using that in your calculations for open space? MR. MOGREN-Yes. Because they really don’t, you know, they put that fence up around the parking lot, and you don’t go outside that fence, and it is an eyesore. MRS. BARDEN-Well, they’re not using it with their calculation. They’re using it as their justification. 48 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MRS. BRUNO-Right. Understood. Thanks. MR. SEGULJIC-I mean, I see no need for the variance. Five percent is not a lot. MRS. BRUNO-How many parking spaces did you say that was? MR. MOGREN-I think it translates to about 10 parking spaces. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, that’s what it said in Staff Notes. MR. MOGREN-On the cover sheet, you know, 7,510 feet required. We’re providing a 6,201. We missed it by about 1300 square feet. MR. SEGULJIC-I would say that in view of the fact that you’re in the Glen Lake watershed area. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, what’s the feeling of the Board? MR. FORD-Maintain, stick with the Code. MS. ALTER-You have three choices. You can recommend favorably. You can recommend negatively, or you can choose to make no recommendation. So, those are your choices. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. MRS. BRUNO-I’m sorry. I’m not seeing it in the notes. How many parking spaces will that translate out to into? MRS. BARDEN-I don’t think it’s in there. MR. MOGREN-It’s not in there. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. MOGREN-The square footage is in there. The difference that we’re missing it by is about 1300 square feet. MR. TRAVER-Your site plan does not eliminate any, as I recall, any permeable ground. You’re removing a building. MR. MOGREN-We are eliminating permeable area, in the DOT right of way. MR. TRAVER-Okay. MR. MOGREN-If you look at the existing conditions plan, and then look at the demolition plan L-2. We’re actually taking out some pavement, and paving it. MR. TRAVER-And paving it, okay. How much? MR. MOGREN-I’m looking at this area on L-2, 10 scale, about 500, 600 square feet or so. MR. TRAVER-So about half of the variance you’re asking for? MR. MOGREN-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-It translates out into about eight parking spaces. MR. MOGREN-Yes, and then as Mr. Traver was saying, we are taking asphalt out of the DOT right of way. Of course we need their approval, which we’re going to seek right after this. So we’re adding some, we’re removing some impervious area from the plan there. You see that on L-2 what I’m talking about? MRS. BRUNO-Yes. MR. FORD-But you’re not bringing it to what the Code calls for? MR. MOGREN-That’s correct. 49 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-I think what he’s saying is it’ll be better than it is currently. MRS. BRUNO-Right. MR. TRAVER-Right. MR. HUNSINGER-So we’re actually getting an improvement in green space MR. FORD-And we also have the potential to bring it to Code. MR. HUNSINGER-I think it’s sounding like we have no recommendation. MRS. BRUNO-Okay. MR. SEGULJIC-I was negative. MRS. BRUNO-I think I’m leaning towards bringing it up to Code. I think you’d still see a good ROI on it. MR. FORD-That’s where I am. MR. MOGREN-Bring it up to Code. So recommend against the variance is what you’re saying? MRS. BRUNO-Right. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, if someone wants to make a resolution, and put it up for a vote. MR. SEGULJIC-Let the comments stand on their own? MR. HUNSINGER-We can do that. MRS. BARDEN-Well, a consensus would be neater. MS. ALTER-Do you want to do that, make no recommendation but give them all the comments? MR. SEGULJIC-Yes. MS. ALTER-And they can do with them as they will. MR. SEGULJIC-Yes. MR. FORD-I think we’ve got an opportunity to state the will of this Board, and I think the will of this Board, consensus is to bring it to Code. I think that’s what we should do. I think that should be our recommendation. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. If someone wants to make that recommendation and put it up for a vote. MRS. BRUNO-Go for it, Tom. MR. HUNSINGER-Go for it. MOTION REGARDING VANCE COHEN TO RECOMMEND TO THE ZONING BOARD TO DENY THE VARIANCE REQUEST, Introduced by Thomas Ford who moved for its adoption, seconded by Tanya Bruno: th Duly adopted this 27 day of March, 2007, by the following vote: MRS. BRUNO-Because of the vicinity to the watershed. AYES: Mr. Traver, Mr. Seguljic, Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Ford NOES: Mr. Hunsinger ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp 50 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MRS. BARDEN-Would you like to table this to a future date? MR. HUNSINGER-You mean for site plan review? MRS. BARDEN-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-I thought we had to wait until the Zoning Board meets? MRS. BARDEN-Well, they will do that in April. So you could table to a May date. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. When is it going before the Zoning Board? thth MR. TRAVER-The 25, April 25. th MR. HUNSINGER-The 25? th MRS. BARDEN-Okay. Thank you, April 25. MR. HUNSINGER-So it will need to be May. nd MRS. BARDEN-May 15 or 22. th MR. HUNSINGER-Why don’t we make it the May 15 meeting. MRS. BARDEN-Okay. MR. MOGREN-And what’s the cut off date for submission for that? th MR. HUNSINGER-It would be April 15. thth MRS. BARDEN-The 15 of April. Actually, I guess you have until the 16, because the th 15 is a Sunday. MR. HUNSINGER-So we’re all set. Does anyone want to make a formal motion? MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 3-2007 VANCE COHEN, Introduced by Chris Hunsinger who moved for its adoption, seconded by Thomas Seguljic: th Until May 15, pending the outcome of the Zoning Board of Appeals review. th Duly adopted this 27 day of May, 2007, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Ford, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you, gentlemen. MR. MOGREN-Thank you. SITE PLAN NO. 9-2007 SEQR TYPE II KATHERINE LAPHAM AGENT(S) STEPHEN & BONNIE LAPHAM OWNER(S) SAME ZONING WR-1A LOCATION 19 SIGN POST ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES RECONSTRUCTION OF AN EXISTING 444 SQ. FT. DOCK AND SUNDECK. BOATHOUSES IN THE WR ZONE REQUIRE REVIEW BY THE PLANNING BOARD. CROSS REFERENCE SP 59-2004 WARREN CO. PLANNING 3/14/07 ADIRONDACK PARK AGENCY YES LOT SIZE: 0.22 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 239.16-1-11 SECTION 179-5-050 MRS. BARDEN-Mr. Chairman, can you go ahead, while we’re here, and table that Katherine Lapham application. MR. HUNSINGER-Sure. MRS. BARDEN-Until April or May. I think your resolution is May. It’s only a tabling because they’re on the second Zoning Board meeting, which is tomorrow night, and they need to get their variance, and they had requested that second meeting. 51 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-So we’d be tabling this until when? MRS. BARDEN-You can table to April or May. The resolution that we had prepared for you is a date in May. MR. HUNSINGER-It just says to one of the May meetings. It doesn’t have a specific date. MRS. BARDEN-I’m sorry. I have a letter here dated today from Mr. O’Connor. This is to the Town of Queensbury Planning Board regarding Katherine Lapham, 19 Sign Post Road. “Because we have yet to have the opportunity to appear before the Zoning Board on this matter, we understand that the Planning Board must table the matter until a later date. We ask that you take this to an April meeting so that we may begin construction on the project prior to Memorial Day. Yours very truly, Michael O’Connor”. MR. HUNSINGER-So they’ve asked that we table it until April. Do you want to do it on th the Special Meeting, April 26? MRS. BARDEN-Sure. MR. HUNSINGER-Would anyone like to put forward that motion? MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 9-2007 KATHERINE LAPHAM, Introduced by Thomas Seguljic who moved for its adoption, seconded by Thomas Ford: To April 26, 2007. th Duly adopted this 27 day of March, 2007, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Ford, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp MR. HUNSINGER-And I will open the public hearing and leave it open. PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MRS. BARDEN-Okay. Thank you. SUBDIVISION NO. 5-2007 SKETCH PROSPECT CHILD & FAMILY CENTER AGENT(S) B P S R; V D S; MILLER ASSOC. OWNER(S) UNITED CEREBRAL PALSY ZONING SFR-1A LOCATION 160 AVIATION ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES SUBDIVISION OF A 3.98 ACRE PARCEL INTO 2 LOTS OF 1.10 AC. AND 2.87 AC. DEEP HOLE TEST PIT DONE, SOILS TO BE MODIFIED, ADDITIONAL TEST REQUIRED. SUBDIVISION OF LAND REQUIRES PLANNING BOARD REVIEW AND APPROVAL. CROSS REFERENCE SP 42-2003 WARREN CO. PLANNING: N/A LOT SIZE 3.98 TAX MAP NO. 295.18-1-73 SECTION A-183 STEPHANIE BITTER & JIM MILLER, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT MRS. BARDEN-Quickly. This is subdivision review and advisory recommendation to the applicant for request of a subdivision at Sketch Plan stage. The proposed is a two lot subdivision of a total four acre parcel into lots of 1.1 and 2.87 acres. The property is located at 160 Aviation Road. This subdivision is to accommodate a future independent residential alternative facility. The Sketch Plan provides a common driveway that will service both the proposed lots. It should be made clear on the plan that the existing access to the lot from Aviation will be abandoned, seeded and mulched. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Good evening. MS. BITTER-Good evening. Stephanie Bitter here with Larry Gouge from Prospect School and Jim Miller. We’re seeking Sketch Plan approval for the parcel identified on the map behind me. The first lot will maintain the existing Administrative building and will be 1.1 acres in size. That’s the one that fronts on Aviation Road. The second lot will be 2.87 acres. It will be the site of the new independent residential alternative facility or IRA. The applicant will be modifying the driveway so that the facilities will share the access and abandon the existing drive which was questioned by Staff. The IRA will be 52 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) similar to the facility that’s existing on Dixon. Pursuant to the Mental Hygiene law, this facility would be deemed a single family residence for zoning purposes. I just wanted to bring that to the Board’s attention. The residence is an eight bedroom facility and will accommodate eight adults, and the applicant is proposing to maintain a 125 foot buffer in the rear of the parcel. I’ll let Jim describe anything further, if you think any additional items are noted. MR. MILLER-I think you got everything. MR. TRAVER-This IRA is going to have eight consumers? Plus how many staff? LARRY GOUGE MR. GOUGE-I don’t think that’s yet totally determined, but we have generally in the evening three to four staff. During the weekdays, they’re all on day programs. So few to none, and weekends probably up to five or six at any given time. That’s just an estimate. Some of the folks do require fairly intensive care. Others are much more independent. MR. TRAVER-Okay. MR. SEGULJIC-I guess why only 125 feet along the backside? Why not more? I’m not sure where that is on the plan. MR. MILLER-I’m not sure why that was selected. I believe when you were talking to Jon Lapper, there was some similar circumstances that was approved previously, and there was 125 foot buffer. The lot’s very deep. It’s over 700 feet deep, and the intent is to create that second lot in the back, and when we were here previously, they purchased the existing residence, and a number of years ago, we came before the Planning Board. We got an approval. This was converted to an office, and a parking area was provided. So that will remain, but when we came before the Board at that time, some of the neighbors in the area came and expressed a concern about clearing, and so we’ve indicated, you know, a buffer area along the back of the property and no disturbance area of 125 feet along the back of those residences, and you can see where that line is on the plan. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. When you look at that small location plan, there were people from Kiley Lane that showed up that were concerned about visual impacts and noise and some other concerns. MR. MILLER-One of the Staff’s comments had to do with the driveway, and we’ve also prepared site plans, detailed site plans that show that, which will be before you later in the subdivision process, but right now there’s a driveway that comes in and it accesses the garage area, which is used for storage, and then the driveway comes around to the parking area. The proposal is to eliminate that driveway entrance. The pavement will be removed, and that will be seeded and we could add some landscaping across there, and there’ll be a common driveway that’ll access both lots. MR. SEGULJIC-Looks pretty straightforward, I would have to say. MRS. BRUNO-I agree. MR. MILLER-I mean, one of the things, one of the Staff comments talked about when we come back for our next meeting, combining, since it’s a fairly straightforward two lot subdivision, combining the Preliminary and Final approvals together. Is that a possibility? MR. HUNSINGER-Are there any concerns with the distance between the proposed common driveway and the driveway, next driveway to the east? MR. MILLER-The adjoining neighbor’s driveway? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. Is that going to meet the minimum driveway separation for the arterial road? MR. MILLER-Chris, to tell you the truth, I can’t tell you off the top of my head. We could check that. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, well, that’s why we have Sketch Plan, to raise the issues. I didn’t know if you would or not. 53 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MS. ALTER-Could I ask a question? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, go ahead. MS. ALTER-Are the uses on this property, the two uses going to remain under one ownership? I mean, is there still going to be an administration building and then the care facility? Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other questions or comments from the Board? Other than that, I thought it looked pretty straightforward, too. MR. TRAVER-I’m just curious, is this a new program or service that Prospect is offering, or is this an expansion of an existing? MR. GOUGE-We currently have an IRA, Individual Residence Alternative, actually based on the same model, and we have one, and we did develop that about four or five years ago. MR. TRAVER-Okay. MR. GOUGE-So this would be an expansion of an existing service. MR. HUNSINGER-And you mentioned earlier that’s on Dixon? MR. GOUGE-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. I remember when we did the site plan review. MS. BITTER-Jim just asked earlier about combining Preliminary and Final, if that’s something the Board would be willing to entertain. Because I know we already, we submitted for site plan review, and I think the application’s still pending. MR. HUNSINGER-Is there any concern with the Board doing Preliminary and Final subdivision in the same meeting? MR. SEGULJIC-No, I don’t think so. MR. FORD-I’d prefer that. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. I mean, I can’t imagine, you know, at this point, what kind of conditions there would be. I mean, the reason why we do that is if there’s conditions in Preliminary, so that you can then meet the conditions and come back for Final. MR. SEGULJIC-If I’m understanding this correctly, you have to have 330 feet between driveways. MRS. BARDEN-That’s a commercial driveway spacing standard. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. Residential. MRS. BARDEN-The residential calls out for arterial roads, that you have to have double the lot width, but that’s if you don’t have a shared driveway, which they do. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. Okay. Thank you. MRS. BRUNO-Thank you. MR. GOUGE-Thank you very much. MS. BITTER-Is there a date set for the Preliminary or Final? It was already submitted. MR. HUNSINGER-I think it just goes back in the mix. We are going to have another extra meeting in April. So I do have a list. If I had to guess, I would say that it will be heard in April, but don’t quote me. That’s the subdivision. MS. BITTER-All right. Thank you very much. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, you’re welcome. 54 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) SITE PLAN NO. 8-2007 SEQR TYPE UNLISTED STEWARTS SHOPS OWNER(S) SAME ZONING HC-INT. LOCATION 777 DIX AVENUE APPLICANT PROPOSES A 3,128 SQ. FT. STEWART SHOP AND ASSOCIATED SITE WORK. CONVENIENCE STORE AND GASOLINE STATION USES IN THE HC ZONE REQUIRE SITE PLAN REVIEW BY THE PLANNING BOARD. CROSS REFERENCE SP 59-2004 WARREN CO. PLANNING 3/14/07 LOT SIZE 1.5 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 303.19-1-61 SECTION 179-4-020 TOM LEWIS, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Susan, if you want to summarize Staff Notes, please. MRS. BARDEN-The applicant requests site plan review for a 3,128 square foot convenience store and fuel pumps at Quaker Road and Dix Avenue. Most recently, the rd Board heard this application as a discussion item at the January 23 meeting. The site plan shows that curb cuts have been consolidated on both Quaker and Dix. This is a significant improvement. Staff has concerns regarding lighting and landscaping that do th not meet the Code requirements. A March 26 comment letter from Vision Engineering th was received regarding this project. Mike Shaw, Director of Wastewater, in a March 12 e-mail, stated that the parcel will be served by an out of district user contract. Warren th County Planning Board recommended No County Impact at the March 14 meeting. This is a SEQRA Unlisted Action and a Long Form was submitted. MR. HUNSINGER-Good evening. MR. LEWIS-Hi, folks. I’m Tom Lewis. I’m the Real Estate rep. Just going over very briefly, because you guys are obviously having a long meeting for you, we’re zoned right. We’re about 43% green space. We were 24 parking spaces, but when I go over the comments from your Town Engineer, he asked us to eliminate two. So we did that, and we’re also going to make our building and a little smaller. Now I know we could go down but not up, and that’s on the new site plans that I’ll be handing. So we’re going from 3150 to 2954, because we’ve always been 2400. We wanted to go over 3,000, and then we found out there’s a law with a liquor license that you can’t go over 3,000. So that’s why we’re going down. This was approved before for a convenience shop with gas, but we’ve reduced the number of curb cuts from four to two. We’ve improved the shared cut with McDonalds. As I had mentioned at the meeting in January, there is some real difficulty with this, in that there’s more liens on the parcel than the price we’re paying. So I had sent the note to the Chairman asking for a fast track, again. Probably everybody asks for that, but it seems like, Mr. Chairman, that the bank isn’t going to foreclose. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. LEWIS-I mean, they changed their minds, so I’m not in panic mode. What I’d like to do, if I could, is just hand out the 41 comments from your Town Engineer that I just got yesterday. I had spoken with him on Thursday asking whether he could get me that before the meeting, and he said, yes, it looks basic. I don’t think any real difficulty, and then I got 41 comments, all of which I think are easily addressed. MR. LEWIS-Is it okay to hand this out? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. LEWIS-And I’ll be quick. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. LEWIS-And you’ll see there are some circles, SW’s. The SW refers to the stormwater and the circles have all been addressed, and there are four complete sets of all the circles that have been addressed. Now I could easily go over all of these, or I could summarize for you in that, I mean, most of these are all minor. MR. FORD-Forty-one minor issues? MR. LEWIS-Most of them area. Notes on the plans. I’m happy to go over every one of them. MR. HUNSINGER-Before you do, I just want to ask Staff a question. Do you know why we weren’t able to get engineering comments before the meeting? 55 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) th MRS. BARDEN-These are March 26. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. BARDEN-I have copies of them. Would you like them? MS. ALTER-Well, they’ve got the new and improved one, though. MR. LEWIS-Yes, I think I just handed it out. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, I mean, we didn’t have engineering comments in our package from Staff. So that these are the first engineering comments that we’re seeing. MS. ALTER-I’ve been on him to comply with his deadlines, with a whip, but he hasn’t been doing it. So I’ll be on him again. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. I just wanted to ask the question. I didn’t know if there was a reason. MR. SEGULJIC-I got the engineering comments. MR. HUNSINGER-These? th MRS. BRUNO-Dated March 26? MR. HUNSINGER-The same ones? MR. SEGULJIC-The same ones that Mr. Lewis just passed out. MR. HUNSINGER-Are these the ones you e-mailed to us? You e-mailed these to us. MRS. BARDEN-I did? MR. HUNSINGER-You e-mailed these to us. I printed them, but I forgot to bring them with me. Okay. So this isn’t new information tonight. You e-mailed them yesterday, and I reviewed them and printed them and forgot to bring them with me. MRS. BARDEN-I think we’d like to get Dan to turn this around quicker, but I think even my Staff Notes were late and that’s just due to the third meeting. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. No, I appreciate that. I wasn’t trying to chastise anyone. I just wanted to know if there was a reason. We did have three meetings this month, and this was a quick turn around. So, sorry, go ahead. MR. LEWIS-No problem. Now his first five refer to the EAF. Items One, Two, Three and Five we’ve changed, and here are 14 sets for the next meeting. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MRS. BRUNO-You did that in 24 hours? MR. LEWIS-Yes, well, we’re hoping that we could get on one of the April meetings, because I don’t want to push my luck with the bank, but again, this Board has to do what they have to do, but hopefully if they see that we can respond to all 41 comments, by middle of next week we should have our engineer address all of the stormwater management things which are like half the stuff on there. So on Item Five where the engineer suggests that for the sewer we contact City of Glens Falls, we phoned up Mike Shaw. He does not, he says the City has nothing to do with this. So anything sewer related we’re following Mike Shaw’s lead. Now Item Four, we’ve asked, how did we get to 102 cars a day, and this is how. We’ve actually done this before. So we’re kind of canning things, and you’ll see on the back of this the numbers. On the front is a traffic study we did in the middle 90’s, and on the back we extrapolated those numbers based on how much business we think we’ll do. So we’re anticipating 775 customers a day, which equates to 102. Now, someone may say, well, wait a minute. You’re going to do 850 customers a day, and my answer would be, so what. I mean, we’re, I think everyone recognizes that we feed off of the cars on the road. We’re not a traffic generator. So I think this ought to satisfy the engineer as to how we got to 102. 56 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-So just to verify. It says 102 trips per hour. MR. LEWIS-At peak. MR. SEGULJIC-At peak. MR. LEWIS-That’s right. MR. SEGULJIC-So it’s 102 trips per hour. MR. LEWIS-Per hour, at peak, yes, and the calculation you’ll see on the back is you divide by the 19 hour days. You multiply by 1.25 because that’s how they do peak, and you multiply by two, because a car moves in and a car moves out. So going to the 41. MRS. BRUNO-Is this during your ice cream sales? MR. LEWIS-That’s average. That’s average. MRS. BRUNO-I’m pulling your leg. MR. LEWIS-Now, Item Six through Thirteen, twenty-six to thirty-two is all drainage items, and again, I could go over each. Now the items circled have all been put on the plan that we handed in. I’d like to go over, I think, the more important ones. Item 20, he asked that we removed parking space fourteen and eighteen, and those are the spots that are up here. Over here is where he asked that we remove two. So we did it. Then, Item 22 is I think the only area where the engineer and I don’t see eye to eye, which is that he questioned the amount of space between the gas island and the shop, saying that there wasn’t necessarily enough room for two cars. He’s mistaken. That right here, and on the new plan, let me pass this around. We put the cars on there. You’ve got 24 feet between. You could make it work at 20, which is uncomfortably close. At 24, you know, parking spaces can be nine feet. It’s better when they’re 10. So ten times two, like twenty-four is just enough room. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, in fact, the Town Code requires 24 foot aisles, yes. MR. LEWIS-As it should, and that’s what’s there. So you added two cars here, on the new site plan, that will get to fourteen after we get all of our stormwater stuff. So here are the two cars to show that. MRS. BRUNO-Do you know if that’s basically the same as what you have on Bay? MR. LEWIS-I think it is, but I don’t know that, because I don’t think there was any difficulty with that site. MR. HUNSINGER-I’ll tell you, though, the bigger concern, and I remember talking to you about this before, on prior site plans. I was with my wife at the Stewarts on the corner of Bay and Cronin, and she was getting out of the car, and there was a car that came through your site to short cut the corner, and it was a young kid going way faster than he should have been going, and if she wasn’t, I mean, it wasn’t like it was a close call, but it was, you know, you get in the car and you’re like, what the heck is that, and I could see that happening even more here, if someone is coming, you know, driving north on 254 and going to take the right hand turn onto Dix, there may be an interest in cutting through, and if you make too much space between the pumps and the store, they won’t slow down. MR. LEWIS-That’s right, and some other Planning Boards insist upon that. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. LEWIS-They want it more, and, you know, we beg them not to do it. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, and I don’t remember if it was a Stewarts shop or maybe it was another store, convenience store, but we asked them to stripe sort of a walkway, if you will, between the pumps and the front door, and just to make a visual. MR. LEWIS-Do you want me to do that? MR. HUNSINGER-I don’t know. I’m just putting it out there for discussion. 57 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. LEWIS-If you want that, we don’t mind doing that. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. To help, you know, slow drivers down, realize, you know, this is a pedestrian. MR. LEWIS-Yes, striping is easy. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. LEWIS-That should be the hardest thing I ever have to do in this business. MR. HUNSINGER-I didn’t mean to cut you off. MR. LEWIS-I’m in no hurry. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. LEWIS-I feel a sense that I want to get you guys to be able to go home, because I know you’ve got another applicant after me. Item 24, again, that we designed the sewer, the grease trap not grease trap as per Mike Shaw. So we’ll let the Town Engineer know, and I’m sure he’ll be fine with that. Now Item 27, we will add more landscaping. Where we had showed originally only here and here, we’ve now added over here, because I know that was also one of your comments. Unfortunately, there’s just not that much room there. This area here, those are huge, huge ditches, and there isn’t anywhere to put it. We like landscaping. Over the years, I love doing nicely landscaped sites. It’s not that much money. So, I mean, other than there, we’ve added all this here, and if the Board between now, and hopefully your April meeting wants something similar, let me know, and then we go to your favorite subject, which would be 41 items. So I really think, you know, most of those items either have all been addressed or they’re stormwater, other than the three which I mentioned. Now lighting, we thought we were okay, and if you can’t read these numbers, I brought (lost words) and I highlighted in yellow the engineer’s points were that the Code asked for 22 foot candles, and that one area under the soffits is 22.3. One light is 22.3, and so what we were going to ask is, is that okay? Because I thought that our lighting under the canopy, where the maximum, you’ll see also down at the bottom under the canopy there’s another yellow highlight, and what I thought was the Code at 22, our one maximum is a 17.5, but then I got the comments from the Staff, and so I’m not sure that I read the Code right. So I’ll ask Susan or the Board, because also as I said at our January meeting, I’ll say it again now, we want this Board to be very happy with our lighting. It’s not a big deal for me. As long as there’s, you know, enough light so that cars aren’t hitting each other. We don’t need bright lights. MR. SEGULJIC-The lighting I’d like to see is the Stewarts station on 9L. MR. LEWIS-On Ridge and 149, I know. MR. SEGULJIC-Yes, on Ridge and 149. MR. LEWIS-That is the lowest one we have anywhere, and that’s not all that far from this. I think that was about 14.5 or 15, and so this is a 17.5, and I mean, obviously this is a much brighter area. MR. SEGULJIC-But what our Code says is 20 under the canopy, I believe. MR. LEWIS-Right, so we’re 17.5. MR. SEGULJIC-No, I’m sorry, 10 under the canopy, gas station pump islands 10. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, 10. MR. LEWIS-Now does that mean the whole canopy? MR. SEGULJIC-That’s what we’d like to see. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, I think 10’s the average, right? Yes, 10’s the average. I’m looking at Staff Notes rather than the lighting plan, and it says the lighting, the canopy lighting for the fuel pumps is shown as 13.89 foot candles where 10 is the requirement. 58 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. LEWIS-That’s right. Well, in that case we’re going to do 10. If that’s Code, I’m not going to argue with Code. MR. SEGULJIC-Are these recessed lights? MR. LEWIS-They will be recessed. Not, they’ll be flush. They will not hang underneath. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. LEWIS-So what we hand in by next week, Susan, will be 10. If Code is 10, it’ll be 10, and again, we’re hoping that this Board would be willing to accommodate us, to put us on the April meeting, and my hope is that if we’re efficient enough, we will address everything so that we could have a vote that night, and if not, then it’ll be later. This is a seven member Board, isn’t it? This isn’t a five member Board? MR. HUNSINGER-No, it’s seven. Yes. We’re a little short. Was there anything else that you had? MR. LEWIS-We’re hoping maybe the Board may want to deal with SEQRA. MR. HUNSINGER-Questions from the Board? MR. SEGULJIC-There was a comment about the rear of the building having brick. MR. LEWIS-Yes, we changed that. MR. SEGULJIC-You did that. MR. LEWIS-Yes. MR. FORD-Four sided brick. MR. LEWIS-I’m not sure the Board asked for four sides. Didn’t they only? MR. FORD-I see three. MR. LEWIS-I thought, we had two and I thought we were asked for a third. Let me look. MRS. BARDEN-The south elevation is what Mr. Hunsinger asked for at the last meeting, and they’ve done that. MR. FORD-Right, you’ve got that. So it’s only the east that is not. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, that’s the side that faces McDonalds. MR. LEWIS-Right, and also, Susan, the height of the freestanding sign is in the packet that was submitted last time, I think S-9, and it’s 12 feet high, not 20. MRS. BARDEN-Okay. Thank you. MR. LEWIS-It’s modest. We don’t need big signs. I’m just going to give the Staff my notes as to each and every item. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other questions or comments from Board members? MR. SEGULJIC-Are there going to be any light poles on site? MR. LEWIS-Yes. There are nine poles, and that was. MR. SEGULJIC-What’s the height of the light poles. MR. LEWIS-I’ll have to look at the plan. MR. SEGULJIC-I didn’t notice it in your plans. I may have missed it. MR. LEWIS-It should be on one of the detail sheets on what we submitted. 59 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-It’s like 12 feet or something, 11 and a half plus the. MR. LEWIS-That sounds right, yes. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. LEWIS-You can tell I’m not an engineer type. MS. ALTER-That’s a lot of work for your engineer to do overnight. MR. LEWIS-Well, it’s not overnight. You mean this? Well, we’re motivated to get this one through. MS. ALTER-I should have you beating the Town Engineer. MR. LEWIS-When I retire, which I’m going to be 65 in another five years, I’m going to get into land use. I want to do something in land use, because I know that you guys will think this is a weird thing for me to say, but land use is like fun for me. MRS. BARDEN-It’s fun for us, too. MR. FORD-Whatever trips your trigger. MR. SEGULJIC-And this sign, it’s going to be elevated? MR. LEWIS-That’s a freestanding sign that will be 12 feet to the top, that is the freestanding sign, and then the other ones on the right of that are the building sign and the canopy sign, and, no, I can’t guarantee that the price will be $2.09. MR. HUNSINGER-I circled that. Yes, $2.05. MR. LEWIS-$2.05. MR. SEGULJIC-What is the, you say internally illuminated fluorescent lights. We don’t have the wattage or anything like that. MRS. BRUNO-From the sign? MR. SEGULJIC-Yes, because that is my one complaint about your station at Ridge and 149, that sign is really bright compared to everything else. MR. LEWIS-Yes, but that’s kind of in the middle of nowhere, and I think here. MR. SEGULJIC-I live out that way. MR. LEWIS-Well, let me re-phrase that. There’s not as many cars and people there as there will be on Dix and Quaker, and I mean, you know, sure it’s, well, I could find out the wattage if that’s what you want to know. MR. SEGULJIC-Yes, because that’s one of the things we want to start looking at. MR. HUNSINGER-We had a long discussion about it last week. MR. FORD-It’s not just you. It’s not just with Stewarts. MR. LEWIS-No, I never take this stuff personally. I’m sure it’s whatever Bay Road is. If you just go down Bay Road and look at that, that’s what it is. MR. SEGULJIC-I guess what I’m saying that’s a little more light than one would expect, but it’s something we’re trying to get our arms around, because we have no idea. MR. LEWIS-I’ll find out how many watts it is or volts, or ohms or something. MR. FORD-Thank you. It’s probably 120. MRS. BARDEN-The one on Bay or the one on Ridge are you talking about? MR. SEGULJIC-The one on Ridge and 149. 60 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MRS. BARDEN-Right. You indicated. MR. LEWIS-I’m sure this would be the same as Bay Road. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. Bay Road. MR. LEWIS-Just the one down the street. MR. FORD-Bay and Cronin. MR. HUNSINGER-So I guess in addition to stating the wattage, you know, let us know if that’s the same or different than what’s on Bay. MR. LEWIS-Okay. It’ll be the same as Bay. It will be the same as Bay Road. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. FORD-And we’d like to know what that is. MR. LEWIS-Okay. Right. MR. FORD-Great. Thank you. MR. SEGULJIC-So to me it looks like he’s addressed a lot of the things. We need the engineering signoff. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. Let me just run down the list as we have it so far. Engineering comments. Revised lighting plan, enhanced landscaping plan, the wattage on the illuminated sign. Was there anything else, and most of this you’ve already submitted. MR. LEWIS-Yes. We will have all of it by the end of next week, but my target date is th Wednesday. I know your file date’s the 15, but if I’m asking to be on one of the April th meetings, we’ll get it in before the 15. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, to me, I don’t see much more time with this application for next meeting. That’s just me speaking. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-We just have to verify basically (lost words). MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. We do have a public hearing scheduled. I will open the public hearing. PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MR. HUNSINGER-I will leave the public hearing open. Would anybody like to offer a tabling resolution? MR. LEWIS-Would it not be appropriate to do SEQRA now? Is that not an option? MR. SEGULJIC-I think I’d like to see the final plan. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. We typically do it in the same night. MR. LEWIS-Fine, no problem. th MR. HUNSINGER-I’ll go ahead. If you can get all the materials in by April 6, we could th hear this on the 24. th MR. LEWIS-On the 24 of April? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. th MR. LEWIS-April 6 it is. MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 8-2007 STEWARTS SHOPS, Introduced by Chris Hunsinger who moved for its adoption, seconded by Tanya Bruno: 61 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) th To the April 24 meeting, pending the submission of the following: 1.The applicant shall address engineering comments. 2.The applicant shall provide a revised lighting plan that complies with the Town Code. 3.The applicant shall provide an enhanced landscaping plan, and the applicant shall provide details of the wattage on the illuminated sign. th Duly adopted this 27 day of March, 2007, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Ford, Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp MR. LEWIS-Great. Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. MR. LEWIS-How was the Saratoga County conference? Did you like that? MRS. BRUNO-I was just going to say, and I wanted to tell you that I really enjoyed it. I thought it was very informative, but your presentation at lunchtime was great. I have to give you credit. There was a bit of juggling that you had to do because of, you know, things that ended up coming up last minute, but it was. MR. LEWIS-Well, that was because of AMD. They were so obnoxious. AMD, you know, we’re so special. You’ve got to put us on and bump these other guys off and they were a pain right in the but. MRS. BRUNO-Well, you handled it well. MR. LEWIS-Thank you very much. I’m glad you enjoyed. MRS. BRUNO-I did, the SEQRA end. MR. LEWIS-Next year we’ll be back. Thank you very much. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. SITE PLAN NO. 10-2007 SEQR TYPE UNLISTED CARDIAC REALTY, LLC AGENT(S) NACE ENGINEERING; B P S R OWNER(S) JOHN DREPS ZONING HC- MOD LOCATION BY ROAD, NORTH OF STEWARTS APPLICANT PROPOSES A 19,660 SQ. FT. MEDICAL OFFICE BUILDING AND ASSOCIATED SITE WORK. OFFICE USES IN THE HC-MOD ZONE REQUIRE PLANNING BOARD REVIEW AND APPROVAL. CROSS REFERENCE AV 6-2007; SB 17-04, PZ WARREN CO. PLANNING 3/14/07 LOT SIZE 1.21, 1.0, 1.38 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 296.16-1-16.14, 16.15, 16.16 SECTION 179-4-020 STEFANIE BITTER, TOM NACE, JIM MILLER, REP. APPLICANT, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Susan, if you could summarize Staff Notes when you’re ready, please. MRS. BARDEN-The application is for site plan review for a 19,660 square foot medical office building and associated site work on Bay Road just north of Stewarts. An Area Variance was granted on January 24 for additional parking. The Board could discuss the feasibility of postponing construction of all of the desired parking until it is evident that it rd is needed. The Vision Engineering comment letter dated March 23 has been submitted for review. Mike Shaw comments state that a map plan and report is pending, which includes this parcel. The Warren County Planning Board, at their March meeting, recommended No County Impact, and this is a SEQRA Unlisted Action. A Short Form was submitted. Staff recommends that the Board request a Long Form. MR. HUNSINGER-Good evening. 62 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MS. BITTER-Good evening. Stephanie Bitter here with Jim Miller and Tom Nace, as well as members of Adirondack Cardiology Associates. They’re sitting in the audience. This is a local company currently located on 90 South Street, trying to re-locate in the area. We’re proposing a structure which is 19,660 square feet in size. This facility will have approximately 10, 4 physician’s assistants, and between 45 to 50 employees. I know that Staff identified that we have obtained a variance for the parking calculation. I just wanted to explain that the 128 spaces that were provided in that variance were pursuant to a parking study that the applicant did to determine the number of parking spaces necessary to accommodate the facility, both the individuals that work for the facility as well as the individuals that will visit the facility. The number that they projected incorporated the fact that on any given day there are about 45 individuals associated with Adirondack Cardiology that would be at the site, plus they could be conducting educational programs, drug reps visits, vendors visit, support staff, or support services, patients obviously visit for testing and clinics. Patients bring family members, as well as emergency vehicles. I just wanted to give an explanation because we meet the green space requirement, and I know that Staff commented on staging construction of the parking lot, but we really need the parking. So we’re really not in a position to stage it for construction purposes. I’m going to pass it over to Tom Nace to go into more details now. MR. NACE-Okay. I’ll just quickly hit on the Staff comments. Bob Hatch is here with a building elevation. Let me get that put up. I’ll let Bob just briefly describe what the building’s going to look like, and materials. BOB HATCH MR. HATCH-Good evening. Bob Hatch. I’m with HCP Architects. We’re the architects for the building, along with BBL Medical as the developer. Here’s the four elevations, and the elevation facing Bay Road is the lowest one here. The one facing the other side of the building is from the parking lot and it is the entrance parking. This side is where the Staff entrance is, and it’s the one facing the Stewarts side, and the other along the entry road as you’re coming in. What you’re seeing is a residential scale structure. We tried to break down the structure, 19,000 square feet, into smaller modules, and we used sloped roofing to bring a residential feel to it, and then we tried to use colors that were more in our terms Adirondack colors. That’s why we use the kind of gray/green siding. So roofing shingles, being a weathered look, gray/green siding for the horizontal. The base is what we’re calling a tumbled block. So it’s a fractured block, and it’s tumbled so that the edges are smooth and a rounded shape, so it would give it a softer feel. MR. FORD-You don’t have samples of any of that with you? MR. HATCH-Yes, we do. MR. FORD-Thank you. MR. HATCH-When I put the microphone down, I’ll bring it up for you. The windows are a prairie style window, meaning it has mullions up in the upper reaches of it, and then we put a piece of trim around the windows and over the windows as a pediment. All of the other trim pieces will be similar in color, and I’ll bring those up to you so you can see the color range that we’re talking about. This is gray siding, and we’re putting a trim piece with a lighter color. The other trim is a lighter material around it. Using a darker window piece here, for the frame of the window. The block is a beige colored block that’s split and then rounded on the edges. Then there is a piece of drivet at the entrance which would be in the same color range as the trim pieces. So we’re trying to keep beige and neutral and gray tones, not bright colors. MRS. BRUNO-Does the Board remember what we approved on the deli facility next door? It seems like it was pretty close to this. I meant to look it up before I came. MR. HATCH-Any other questions on what the materials would be or the elevations? MR. FORD-That’s very helpful, thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. HATCH-You’re welcome. MR. NACE-Okay. I’ll move along then. The Staff suggested that a Long Form EAF be submitted. I don’t think we break any barriers here or any thresholds for Type I Action 63 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) that would require a Long Form. If need be, we’ll supply one, but we thought that this type of site was certainly adequate for a Short Form. The lighting levels, we’ve provided lighting that is about 2.1 foot candles average on the main parking lot, one and a half foot candles for the employee lot, and about 6.9 foot candles under the canopy, entry canopy. Those are a hair more than what your Code calls for as I presume what is a minimum. We feel that, with a medical facility, that for elderly and what have you that it’s probably a good idea to have a little higher lighting levels. We don’t think that they’re too high by any means, and we’ve kept the uniformity ratio well within your bounds. So, we feel the lighting is, even though it may be a hair higher than your minimum recommended lighting levels, we feel that it’s justified. MRS. BRUNO-I’m sorry, before you go on. Were the lighting spillages calculated from the building that has, again, the deli that I just mentioned a minute ago? Because we had spoken with that applicant about supplying their lighting plan to the rest of the Dreps. MR. NACE-Yes, we did have their lighting plan, and we used lighting fixtures that were similar, and if you look, the spillage actually at the property line is zero to .1, normally. There’s one, two, three or four places back here just opposite a light that gets up to 1.2, but the spillage, by the time you get back onto the property, the adjacent property, it’s all down to .0, .1, .2, at the very most. So there’s very little spillage. MRS. BRUNO-It seemed low. That’s why I wasn’t sure if. MR. NACE-There’s very little spillage, and that spillage calculation is just, you see this band that’s sort of separated from the edge of the parking lot. That’s that calculation within that band. MRS. BRUNO-Thank you. MR. NACE-Landscaping, I don’t know if you want to talk to landscaping for a minute, Jim or are you all talked out for tonight? MR. MILLER-The landscape plan, what we’ve tried to do, by having the parking around the back, and the staff parking to the side, what we’ve tried to do is along the frontage on Bay Road, we’re planting shade trees, continuing shade trees out along the property line. The sign will be centrally located in the building. There’ll be a stone retaining wall that would be similar in color to some of the materials on the building where we have the drainage basin in the front, to set that area off where we’ll have a freestanding sign which will be landscaped. The street trees will continue down the side street along the cul de sac, and we’ve provided substantial trees throughout the parking lot, complying with the one per ten cars, and then planting in the islands throughout the parking area. What we’ve done along the deli side there’ll be shade trees along there, but we’ve introduced some Norway Spruce screening along that property line, and then the other, against the building, we have the detention basin. So we have a slope that comes from the face of the building down to that basin, and then the areas above where we have that berm along the front of the building, if you will, we’ve introduced some ornamental planting in here which would consist of flowering shrubs, smaller flowering trees, and perennials, to provide a foreground and to provide some landscaping along the detention basin area. The other thing we tried to accomplish, you know, all of our utilities, our dumpster area is all back in the area of the staff and the service entrance, and there’ll be some berming in that area, and the evergreens will continue around, so that from Bay Road the views to that parking lot and the views to the dumpster and the transformers and those areas then will all be buffered with evergreens, and we used a combination of spruce and arborvitae throughout those areas, and then, you know, some general landscaping along the patients’ entrance off the main parking lot. This area will be landscaped, again, with flowering material and perennials. MR. NACE-Okay. Any questions on landscaping? Anything you want to cover while we’re on that? Okay. One of the Staff comments concerned the design guidelines for the Bay Road corridor. As I think Bob Hatch already described, we’ve attempted to break the building into smaller pieces and come up with a residential roofline that’s broken up to meet those actually even though we don’t have to, but to comply with those guidelines. Also the way we’ve set up the parking behind the building, with just a smaller amount of staff parking off to the side, again, complies with your Bay Road guidelines. The sign, as Jim said, there’s a sign proposed out front. We’re not applying for any variance that will be sign application submitted once the details of that are known, but at this point we don’t have the actual detailed sign layout, but that would be a separate permit, and it would comply with zoning. We’ve received a letter from Vision Engineering. We just got the Staff comments and letter yesterday, early yesterday 64 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) afternoon. I’ve gone through it. Any particular items there that you would want to discuss in detail, I will be glad to elaborate on. Most of it deals with stormwater drainage, or stormwater management, and a lot of it we have already complied with. It just needs some clarification to explain where and how we’ve complied, and the remaining items we will comply with, have no trouble with complying with. So, again, if there are any issues there, in particular that you would like to discuss, I’ll be glad to go into some depth on it. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Anything else? MR. NACE-No. MR. TRAVER-I’d like to go back to the lighting plan, if we can. Your current plan shows essentially double, well not essentially, it is double the Code. MR. NACE-For the main parking? MR. TRAVER-For the main parking lot, yes, and I understand your comment. That was interesting about it being a medical facility. Are you planning on doing catheritizations out of the parking lot or something? MR. NACE-No. It’s two foot candles, which is not a very high level of lighting, okay, and your Code really sort of specifies a minimum safe lighting level that you would like to see, and simply my comment was, you know, typically in a medical facility you tend to get a larger percentage of elderly people. Their eyesight might not be as good, and you just like a little better level of lighting for safe operation. MR. TRAVER-Do you have an idea of what your hours of operation would be? MR. NACE-No, but there are people here that I’m sure. DAVE SCHWENKER DR. SCHWENKER-Hi. Dave Schwenker, cardiologist. We currently can have patients there and staff there at seven o’clock in the morning and people there easily until six o’clock at night. There’s certainly issues with medicine now about extending office hours. The key thing is that’s into the dark hours. We get people in in the morning in the dark, and people certainly after dark or certainly well into dusk at night, and, you know, I think, what, 50% of our population is Medicare, is that about right? And I would really have concerns that we have adequate lighting for those people for safety. I mean, I understand we don’t want it to look like it glows in the dark, but clearly these people, we have concerns about them. MR. TRAVER-Would the parking lot lights be left on all the time at night, or only during office hours? DR. SCHWENKER-We can set them any way you please. Again, you know, we have our current lighting on the timers, though for security you need to leave some light on. MR. TRAVER-Well, I hope you would consider reducing that lighting level. MR. NACE-I’m not sure how much it can be reduced to. I think the more objectionable thing, when you start looking at the lighting, is not necessarily the average level, but vertical and horizontal projection and these cut offs to reduce glare, but also the hot spots, okay, and this lighting plan, if you look at it, (lost words), and those are typically what’s visually objectionable to people when they’re looking at a site. MR. HUNSINGER-Other questions or comments? MR. SEGULJIC-How about the sign out front? MR. NACE-Details? Typically with the site plan, generally submit the details of the sign. (Lost words). So all I can say at this point, it will comply with Code, and, you know, it’s going to be in a landscaped area there. Obviously they’ll want it to look nice. MR. SEGULJIC-Something low to the ground, I assume? MR. NACE-Yes, absolutely. Something that would fit in better with the retaining wall and the landscaping. 65 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. SEGULJIC-Other than that, I think it looks good. MR. HUNSINGER-I had some questions. I like the building design. I commented to Tanya. We seem to be getting a lot of variations on this theme, you know, and I think particularly in this location it works very well. I like the color scheme, you know, the landscaping, but the big problem I have with it is the way the building is oriented. You have frontage on two streets, and you have two entrances, but the entrances don’t match the streets. So, you know, when you drive by it, you’re going to see, you know, a blank wall, and I just wonder, you know, why it was designed, I mean, you have such a beautiful building design, why didn’t you put the face to the street more, at least the side street. MR. MILLER-Well, I mean, this is what has been coming about and, you know, you look on Rich’s buildings and things, by getting the parking around the back, we obviously have to get the people from the parking lot directly into the building. We can’t take them and walk them all, especially in a medical building like this, walk them all the way around. I mean, we’ve dealt with the same thing with the previous application I was here for, where, you know, we’ve got to have the entrance at the parking area, and in this particular case, though, I think the architects did a really good job at articulating the building and adding a lot of interest to the building. Granted there’s no doorways or anything there. I think they’re very interesting elevations. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, but the nicest elevation is the back. MR. MILLER-That’s where people are closest to it, though. MR. HUNSINGER-I just, you know, maybe it’s a rhetorical comment at this point, but I’m not a designer, so I can’t, but you have a drive up, you know, drop off driveway to the front door, you know, and I could envision that on the side street with the parking still in the rear. I mean, I give you kudos for putting the parking in the rear, but I just wonder if there’s a different way to present the building to the street. MR. MILLER-I think the only problem we would have with that, Chris, is then you’ve got people coming in and dropping off, and especially in cases where you have elderly and things, and then having to go back onto the road and then back around to the back, I think what we want that to do is be very efficient where people can come in and drop off and then, you know, in a lot of cases they’re dropping someone off who is basically getting out and they’re going to have to wait to be assisted into the building. So we want to have people be able to parking and assist these people into the building fairly quickly. So I think that’s our main concern here is that that drop off and the relationship of the parking to that patient entrance is very efficient. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, I could be the only one that has these comments, too. MR. SEGULJIC-And I agree with Chris. There’s no problem with having that in the back, but could you have something else on the Bay Road side to make it look, have more curb appeal, shall we say? It’s a great looking building. Don’t misunderstand, but have it just, like Chris says, one long wall. MR. NACE-Bob, would you like to take a shot at that? MR. HATCH-Well, it’s hard to talk about design when you’ve done it and then try and tell you that there’s something better to do. We didn’t think that there was anything better to do, or we would have done it. We did add to the roof scape on that side, to add an element within the roof to, again, bring it down to scale, and we have framed out all the windows, and actually we did a grouping of all the windows and actually we did a grouping of the windows to try and group some under this feature on the roof. So to say what more could you do? You can always add, but architecture doesn’t typically add for no reason. We don’t need an entrance on that side. We really don’t want people walking in from that side. It wouldn’t make sense. Bay Road, as you know, is a speedy lane. Architects, when they design for something where there is cars going at speed, you tend to upscale, you don’t downscale, because the little details aren’t seen anyway. You’re going right by them. I don’t know what the speed is there, but people are going by at say 40, 45. MR. HUNSINGER-It’s 35 at that point. 66 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HATCH-Okay. So typically that’s one of the reasons we wouldn’t put a lot more detail there because you’re really not going to see it, and then we try and detail the side where people are going to be at a pedestrian level. MR. MILLER-I think the one thing that we tried to do with the site, with some of the other buildings on Bay Road they’ve got the transformers and some of the utilities out on that side, which really makes it look like the back. We tried to be sensitive to that here, and got the utilities down more to the side where we’ve got plenty of room to screen them. So we’re not putting them in front of the building and trying to do a lot of screening of the utilities. So I think moving the utilities out of the way helps a lot. MR. HUNSINGER-But I mean, clearly the, again, it’s a beautiful building, but by far the most appealing side is the side that most of the people driving by will never see. I mean, you only see it if you drive around to the back and go inside. MR. HATCH-And it’s meant to be at that pedestrian level that you do most of your detail. That’s really the point of it. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. HATCH-So I do understand what you’re saying, but I don’t know how to answer it. MR. SEGULJIC-All of the landscaping in front of the building is the low shrubs. Is that correct? Right in front of the building. MR. MILLER-Along Bay Road? MR. SEGULJIC-Yes. MR. MILLER-Well, it’s a combination. What we tried to do is we tried to create groupings of plants. If you look at them, you know, we have, like service berry in there. So the most high stem small tree, flowering tree, and then group that with some other shrubs, because, you know, like Bob was saying, when you’re viewing this from Bay Road, what you’re really going to get a sense of is the massing of the shrubs, and you’re going to see it more in groupings than you’d see the individual plant. So what we tried to do is get a series of groupings, and the other thing we tried to do is work the planting in with the building elevations and instances where we have some expanses of siding, those are the areas we try to locate the flowering trees so that the landscaping and the building elevation kind of works well together. MR. SEGULJIC-All right. So you’re going to have, if I’m looking at this correctly, you’re going to have some crabapple trees in the front then? MR. MILLER-Well, I think that we had crabapples kind of anchoring the corners, because they’re a little bit bigger, and then in the stretches along the building elevations, where we’ve got the multi stem service berry. MR. SEGULJIC-So there’s going to be some elevation there? MR. MILLER-Yes. We’re looking at, between the crabapples and the shadblow, we’re looking at trees that will get 20, 25 feet high, ultimately, you know, they’re not shade trees but they’re good sized flowering trees. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, that makes me feel better, then. MR. MILLER-And then out along the road, of course, we’ve got the shade trees, you know, which we’d be looking under. MR. FORD-I want to just reinforce what Chris’ observation was. The building is very attractive. It certainly would be appreciated if the Bay Road façade could have more interest, could be more interesting. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other questions or comments from the Board? Have you responded, officially, to the engineering comments? MR. NACE-No, like I say, we just got them yesterday afternoon. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. 67 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. NACE-I’ve been through them. I’m comfortable that they can adequately respond to all of them. Some of them are already on the plans. They just needed to be pointed out where they were. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. NACE-And like I say, if there are any particular ones that you have interest in, I’ll be glad to go into detail. MR. HUNSINGER-I guess there were two that I had questions on. Item Thirteen, well, there were a couple of comments that talk about a permanent pool. MR. NACE-Correct. MR. HUNSINGER-And then, you know, the comments potential freezing of the permanent pool should be considered. MR. NACE-Yes. In the North Country we’ve got that on all of our ponds, and what it is is above the level of the permanent pool there’s an additional foot that’s already there in the design, a free board for storage of water on top of that ice layer, before it overflows into another controlled outlet in our outlet structure. So that’s already incorporated. MR. HUNSINGER-And then the other comment, and I’m not sure I really understand what they’re saying, so you may not even be able to address it. Item 15, where they say the design meets the 50 year storm design requirement, but then it says it should be noted the total volume of runoff discharge from this site is increased by 45%. MR. NACE-Okay. So your stormwater regs, specific stormwater regs to Queensbury outside of the Lake George basin include the requirement that nobody can meet on a tight soil site. It says not only that the peak flow rate has to be kept to pre-development conditions for a 50 year storm, but also that the runoff volume has to be kept less. When you have a site with impermeable or very slowly permeable soils, nobody can do it. MR. HUNSINGER-So where does the runoff go? Where does discharge go? MR. NACE-It discharges where it does now, okay, down to the, across the road, or across the entrance drive and into the low area, but it goes out at a very small, metered rate, compared to the existing peak flow that occurs from the site, okay. The real crux of that item issue is that your, the way the existing regulations in your book, in your Zoning Code are written, it can’t, you can’t meet the volume requirements, okay. We’ve all kind of gone back to DEC regulations and with their regulations we’re at the 10 and 100 year storms, we’re just dealing with peak flow discharge rates. We’re not dealing with volumes. We deal with volumes for the water quality treatment and the one year storm, okay, but we don’t deal with the volumes when it comes to the ten and hundred year storms, because DEC recognizes that you just can’t do it. It’s an impossibility, and what it boils down to is your existing Code, when it was written, wasn’t thoroughly researched. MS. ALTER-Well, we have MS-4’s now and we have a more stringent standard. So if you can’t do what’s in the Code, we’ve got a problem. MR. NACE-We are meeting your stringent standard. It’s just that your Code also includes a 50 year storm requirement that doesn’t, it really doesn’t have anything to do with DEC. It’s just, it’s one of those arbitrary things. Originally, when the Code was written, you had, if I can remember right, at that point you had a 25 year storm to deal with and a 50 year storm to deal with, and somewhere along the way when the Code was written the last time, the 50 year ended up having a volume requirement with it, and it just, it doesn’t have any place in the stormwater calculation. We are meeting the requirements for DEC, in this Phase II stormwater permits, which are actually more stringent than your Code. MS. ALTER-We have a mandate to fix our drainage from the Federal government under the MS-4 Stormwater Regulations. MR. NACE-Correct. MS. ALTER-And that means you can’t discharge more water from your site than you’re discharging now. MR. NACE-You can’t discharge more peak rate. 68 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MS. ALTER-We can argue about semantics, but the end result is when people discharge water and it goes to someone else’s property, it creates a flooding situation on the roads. So I think that we need to have a sidebar about drainage with Dan Ryan. MR. NACE-Sure, I have no problem with that. We’ll satisfy Dan Ryan on all the issues here. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. NACE-Okay, but we are addressing the flooding issue by retaining that water and metering it out very slowly, so that your flood conditions have passed by the time our water is discharged. That’s the reason for the peak flow rate requirements is to hold your water on the site until your downstream flood conditions have mitigated. So that, you know, your water is released more slowly over a longer period of time. MR. FORD-You cannot hold and discharge on site? MR. NACE-Well, there’s no place, on a site with tight soils, it’s not like out on the west side of the Northway where we have sandy soils and we can just infiltrate, you know, excess runoff into the soil. MR. FORD-Basins are not an option? MR. NACE-Well, I guess there is a semantics problem here, okay. Discharge rate, okay, deals with that peak flow rate that goes out. Discharge volume says that, you know, you can store it, okay, but then you’re going to eventually discharge it, okay, and the volume is that total volume, whether you discharge it during the storm or two days after the storm. Okay. That is entailed in that volume. I don’t know how to explain it any better. MS. ALTER-I understand the problem that you’re having with the soils. I do understand that, but you can’t break the law, and we’re about to make it more stringent. Because we have to, we have mandates. We have stormwater infiltrating in our sewers, and we have to fix it, and if we let people discharge water off the site, we can’t fix it. So we need to have a sidebar. We don’t need to waste the Planning Board’s time. MR. NACE-We can’t retain it on our site forever. You’ve got to do something with it, and we will satisfy Dan, and we do meet DEC requirements. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Anything else from the Board? We do have a public hearing scheduled for tonight. Is there anyone here that wanted to make comments to the Board on this application? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MR. HUNSINGER-What’s the will of the Board? It sounds like we have some engineering issues to deal with. MR. NACE-I think most of the engineering stuff, in fact all of it, is, you know, clarification, fairly minor stuff, you know, that we would ask that if all possible that you would consider a contingent approval based on getting Dan’s signoff. MR. SEGULJIC-That’s the only issue I see, is engineering issues. MR. HUNSINGER-Do members feel comfortable with a contingent approval? MR. FORD-I’m not feeling very comfortable right now. MRS. BRUNO-I’d like to see the stormwater smoothed out first. MR. FORD-Yes, that needs to be addressed in greater detail and maybe it’s the hour and my lack of ability to grasp it, but I need more. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Well, would anyone like to put forward a resolution to table. BOB SEARS MR. SEARS-Chris, is the public hearing still open? 69 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-It is still open. If you want to make a comment, though, Mr. Sears, you have to come up to the mic. MR. SEARS-My name is Bob Sears. I’m the realtor involved in this. Is the only issue the engineering issue with water drainage runoff? Is that basically the only issue you’re dealing with here? MR. HUNSINGER-Well, there’s some other engineering issues as well, but I think that’s the predominant issue, yes. MR. SEARS-Is there any engineers on this Board? MR. HUNSINGER-No. MR. SEARS-If the Board, if the engineer you hire okays it or mediates with Tom Nace, their engineer, wouldn’t it be more feasible to go ahead and make it a contingent approval, and that the engineers hammer it out to your specifications or whatever specifications they come out with, other than to make these people come back, two months from now, and go over a specific thing that could be resolved between the engineers beforehand? MR. HUNSINGER-We have done that on occasion, yes. MR. SEARS-That’s the only point I wanted to make. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. SEARS-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. MR. FORD-Just be consistent. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, what’s the feeling of the Board? MRS. BRUNO-I’m leaning towards maintaining consistency, that which we expect to do with all of our applicants. We like to give everyone the due process as well. There could be some argument that we’re not engineers, but we were nominated to be here to review things, to review applications, and I’d like to say that I hope there’s, I know that there’s a certain, I’m at a loss for words, it’s the midnight hour. MS. BITTER-I think just that the applicants and Bob Sears are trying to communicate that unfortunately the applicants are kind of at a disadvantage because you come here this evening with the comments, and obviously our engineer is prepared to respond, but Dan Ryan’s not here, so we would get delayed again, just to hear him sign off on things that I don’t know if Tom had discussions with him or not. So I think that’s why we were trying to see if it could at all be possible that the Board condition it with the engineer’s approval and signoff. So that’s really, I think, the position that we were in. MS. ALTER-It’s the Board’s decisions, but we have some really serious stormwater issues with this plan, and I’m not going to acquiesce to Mr. Nace when Mr. Ryan has said that there are problems. I think we need to iron it out before the Board approves it. MRS. BRUNO-I tend to agree, and we have Mr. Ryan coming next month. I don’t know if we could end up tabling it to that particular night so that we have him on board already. MR. NACE-And these, you know, I feel confident that I can easily answer Dan’s concerns, and, you know, if we had been given a couple of more days to get stuff revised and back to him, I’m sure we could have been here tonight with a clean bill of. So I would have no problem if you could table this until the next available meeting in April, that we can certainly have these all addressed. MR. FORD-Can we do that, Chris? Do we have the availability? MR. HUNSINGER-We tabled that, yes, I was just looking to see. That was The Michaels th Group project, we tabled that to the 17 and asked that the Town Engineer be here for that discussion. So would anyone like to make that? MR. TRAVER-That was 4/17? 70 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-Are we still talking about requesting that the lighting be reduced? MR. HUNSINGER-Well, that was the other outstanding issue. I don’t know if the Board’s happy with the answers provided by the applicant. They are generally within the Uniformity Ratios. Although the overall was a little greater than what the Town Code requires. MR. NACE-Well, your Town Code, it’s a little unclear the way it’s written, but I believe they’re intended to be minimum levels. MS. ALTER-You’re missing the signage, too, I believe. MS. BITTER-I think that we indicated it hasn’t yet been designed and we’re indicated it would be a monument sign with incorporated landscaping. MRS. BRUNO-Chairman, I have a question for you, actually, that I had put in my notes. I was reading the ZBA minutes, and since you’re on the PORC Committee, has the PORC Committee addressed changing the parking formula for medical offices. MR. HUNSINGER-No. MRS. BRUNO-No. Okay. They haven’t addressed it, or it seemed to be equivalent? MR. HUNSINGER-We pretty much, with current parking, we said that it seems to be working. So there’s really no reason to change the ratios. MRS. BRUNO-One thing that I would like to do is just educate myself on what the lighting layout or what the photo metrics over at Glens Falls Hospital. Understandably it’s not in Queensbury, but you can’t get a much larger medical facility in the area than that, and I think I’d like to put that in the tabling motion, too, that we need to still consider that. I can appreciate the need for safety, by far, but we’ve got the time. We may as well look at it. MR. SEGULJIC-What are you proposing to look at, though? MRS. BRUNO-I’d like to get on board with what the applicant is saying as far as needing the lighting in excess of what our Code is before I say okay, I agree. In other words, I’d like to visit a medical facility and see how most places. MR. SEGULJIC-I guess we’d have to look at the plans and see what the actual photo metrics are. I don’t know how we’d do that. MR. HUNSINGER-We have the photo metrics for the office buildings just further up the road on Bay. That would at least give us a basis of comparison. MRS. BARDEN-Do you know which ones, specifically, that have been approved in the last? MR. HUNSINGER-Well, I was just thinking of Schermerhorn’s properties, on that same side of Bay. MR. MILLER-I believe at the time that those were done, you know, if you went back and if you pulled those lighting diagrams, I think what you’ll find is just the ISOlucks drawings that just sort of a contouring, because at the time it wasn’t required to do a complete photo metric study like this. So I think it would be hard to compare the two. Because what happens, when you look at the ISOlucks, it just shows each light and it doesn’t take into account the light that’s being cast from the adjoining lights. So I think it would be hard to look at those, to tell you the truth. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thanks, yes, that’s good to know. MR. MILLER-Because I remember those. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. FORD-Thank you. 71 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-Is there another recent facility that you could suggest with similar? MR. MILLER-I can’t think of one offhand that’s been built yet. MR. HUNSINGER-How about the office building on Aviation, across from Sokols? MR. MILLER-That was Dick Jones’ office. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. BRUNO-Behind there there’s a clinic of some sort, behind Stewarts. MR. MILLER-I don’t know, I didn’t work on that. MRS. BARDEN-I’ll go back and find. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thanks, Susan. MR. FORD-Where Dr. Blood is. It’s Dr. Blood’s office, et. al. MR. HUNSINGER-So I guess the two issues, the outstanding issues, are addressing engineering concerns, and looking at lighting schemes. MR. NACE-What about the sign? Is that going to become an issue? MR. HUNSINGER-Well, you kind of said you didn’t have a design yet. They didn’t know what they wanted. MR. NACE-Whether we’re going to be forced to come up with a sign design between now and then. MRS. BRUNO-Can we come up with at least an idea of the size. I know you were saying it’s monument, but in terms of the width and that type of thing. MR. HUNSINGER-Width and height. MR. MILLER-I could do a concept. MR. NACE-Sure. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MRS. BARDEN-Did you decide that the Bay Road elevation is satisfactory? MR. HUNSINGER-I think we sort of acquiesced on that. MR. FORD-We’ve given them feedback. What they do with it, I guess would be, the ball would be in their court. MR. NACE-So noted. MR. MILLER-One of the things with this kind of building, typically the rooms lend themselves to smaller windows, not having a lot of glass. So that’s part of their problem. MRS. BRUNO-You opened it up. I’m sorry. You’ve got that one area that you’ve got some conference room areas. Rooms like that, I know you’ll end up needing to change your roof structure, but rooms like that you could actually open up having larger, taller windows, maybe breaking them with transits overhead that are larger, and then maybe bringing in some of the details from the entrances. You’ve got kind of an arbor type look that you could bring over to there and incorporate that into your landscaping plan, just throwing that out there. I was looking at that, probably some, and going back and forth between the plans and the elevations and everything, and one thing I was trying to thinking of is elevations do tend to flatten, and when you’re driving south to north, you know, you’re to be looking at the employee entrance going towards the elevation in question here, and then vice versa coming south. MR. TRAVER-That’s going to be pretty well screened. 72 (Queensbury Planning Board 03/27/07) MR. HUNSINGER-I was going to say, the employee entrance will be screened. MR. MILLER-Yes, I think it will, especially when the deli’s built there and the planting. MRS. BRUNO-You’ve got a little bit of an angle there, but it seems like, I understand what Mr. Hatch is saying that, you know, they’ve done what they think is the best job, and I think, I don’t have a huge problem with it. I think maybe there could be some tweaking, some things that are changed a bit, but I do like how it was handled, in terms of the landscaping to bring a different type of interest. MR. FORD-A miniaturization of the opposite view would add interest. I keep going back to that word interest. MRS. BRUNO-I guess we need to do a formal motion. th MR. HUNSINGER-We need to do a motion to table, yes. We will table it to April 17. th Submission of materials will be due April 6. MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 10-2007 CARDIAC REALTY, LLC, Introduced by Chris Hunsinger who moved for its adoption, seconded by Thomas Ford: thth Tabled to April 17. Submission materials will be due April 6. Tabled for the following issues: 1.So the applicant can address engineering comments. 2.So the applicant can provide some details on the sign, and 3.So the applicant and the Board can do additional analysis of the lighting plan. th Duly adopted this 27 day of March, 2007, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Ford, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Thanks for your patience. MR. FORD-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-If there’s nothing else before the Board, a motion to adjourn is in order. MOTION TO ADJOURN THE QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MEETING OF MARCH 27, 2007, Introduced by Chris Hunsinger who moved for its adoption, seconded by Thomas Seguljic: th Duly adopted this 27 day of March, 2007, by the following vote: AYES: Mrs. Bruno, Mr. Ford, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: Mr. Traver ABSENT: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sipp On motion meeting was adjourned. RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED, Chris Hunsinger, Chairman 73