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Township of how zon Board of adjustment Monday February 24th 2025 regular meeting I hereby declare this meeting of the how Township zoning board to be open adequate notice having been given pursu to the New Jersey open public meeting
act in the following manner first on January 2nd 2025 a copy of said notice was emailed to the Asbury Park Press and on the Star Ledger second on January 2nd 2025 a copy of said notice was hand delivered to the clerk of the township of
Howell third on January 2nd 2025 said notice was posted in the office of the zoning board and all the bullet aboard in the how Township Municipal Building 4567 Route 9 how Township New Jersey in accordance with the fire prevention code
and for your safety please be advised that this facility is designed with two emergency exits at the front and the rear of the meeting room furthermore smoking is not permitted in the municipal building please take note that this meeting is being videotaped for
possible future broadcasts on Howell Township TV 77 thank you thank you iink we have a roll call Mr burillo here Mr caner here Mr odonnell here Mr Rosco is is running
late running late Mr Ryan present miss scotson here Mr cabakis here chairman Martin says excuse for tonight and chairman Hughes here you have a quorum thank you pledge
of allegiance folks that's aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank
you Mr be want to swear in the professionals please Tes I do I doe your Charles Kliff Jennifer beam professionals Mr thank you next up we have our approval of minutes minutes for
uh January 27th 2025 eligible voters burillo caner karacus odonnell Hughes Martin Orosco Ryan and scotson do we have a motion please I make a
motion roll call please Mr burillo yes Mr caner yes m Mr Hughes yes Mr odonnell yes Mr Ryan yes Miss scotson
yes and Mr cabakis yes thank you now we have the uh minutes for December 16th 2024 eligible voters caner Hughes Martins Orosco and scotson do I have a motion
motion second please second thank you roll call who was second I'm sorry uh caner thank you Mr caner yes Mr Hughes yes and Miss scotson yes minutes approved thank you and finally for
February 10th 2025 eligible voters burillo caner Hughes odonnell Martens and scotson I'll make a motion to approve we have a second second thank you Mr burillo yes Mr caner yes Mr
Hughes yes Mr odonnell yes and Miss scotson yes minutes approved thank you do we have any correspondence I have two things for correspondence tonight case number ba 2406 Turkish American
Foundation needs to Reen notice they will be rescheduled with notice to April 7th 2025 uh with an expiration date will be given by their attorney uh currently expires April 3rd but he will send me a
expiration tomorrow okay so anybody that may be here for the Turkish American religious Foundation case ba 2406 the uh meeting will be moved with notice till to April
7th the next thing for correspondence I have case number ba2 2- 01 Holdings LLC will be carried to April 7th 2025 with no further notice and an extension will also be granted by the attorney
tomorrow currently it expires April 3rd 2025 okay so anybody may be here for case number ba 2201 Holdings the uh me they have been moved to April 7th without notice
that's it for the correspondence Eileen yes that's all okay then we have one resolution for tonight uh case number ba 2414 Springer the herbery at bar Creek we have eligible voters burillo cancer
Hughes odonnell Orosco Ryan and Mertens and Mr bar you have something you'd like to add to that yes Mr chairman I received from our board engineer Mr conliff what I would call two CL clarifications to the draft resolution um which I also reviewed uh with the
applicant's attorney late this afternoon so and it it just um provides more detail as to the location of the driveway that was to be widened as a as a requirement or condition of approval
and uh clarifying that uh installation of curban sidewalk along the property Frontage is is also subject to Mammoth County review and approval since it's a County Road and with those two sub clarifications I would recommend
approving uh the resolution with Charlie's changes Andy if I could just jump in not having to do with the resolution but I just wanted to let the board know that the property owner reached out to me about the trash enclosure that we allowed them to have
uh PVC as opposed to masonry which we typically require he was concerned about the what would be underneath I I checked with Matt Howard and we agreed that in under the guise of
not trying to give these Farms a hard time on putting forth events that we would allow him to keep the the dumpster in an enclosure but on gravel we don't we're not making him put like a concrete pad underneath so I just wanted to let you guys know that that's kind of what I
told him if it's not okay let me know and I'll let him know but I'm trying not to force him to spend a ton of money to put in to put in enclosure does anybody have any issues with that swapping out concrete for stone no no no no no
objections okay that's perfect thank you all right so we'll go ahead Andy and uh do a vote on the resolution yes so I said just as clarified by Mr cess comments which the applicants aware
of okay I which I did email to Eileen okay also late this afternoon so she has the last version all right so you got the ball on it but we'll go ahead uh we have a motion to uh memorialize that a motion to approve Mr burillo I'll second
that Mr second roll call E Mr Mr burillo yes Mr caner yes Mr Hughes yes Mr odonnell yes and Mr Ryan Yes resolution
approved thank you we make a note that Mr Orosco has joined the meeting all right so applications before the board case ba218 Fort Plains Road Partners it's a use and bulk variant to construct One
Flex Warehouse one self storage building description of it of the application is Fort Plains Partners LLC as applicants and Fort Plains Partners LLC lot 6.01 and 1499 holding company LLC Lots 1503 and
1504 seek uh use variants and bulk variants approval to construct one uh story Flex Warehouse with mezzanine office space and one four story self storage building and storm mortar Management systems on the premises known
as block 137 lot 6.01 15.03 and 15.04 on Fort Plains Road this is a icated application as the applicant is only seeking use variants approval at this time the application was partially heard on August 26 2024 when it was carried to
September 9th 2024 with no further notice after some additional testimony on September 9th the application was carried October 28th 2024 when it was carried to December 16th 2024 with no further notice after more testimony on
December 16th it was carried to February 24th 2025 with no further notice now we have eligible voters caner Hughes Martens aroso and scotson but I think we have some people that certified can we clear that up I have Mr burillo
certified Mr odonald certified Mr Ryan certified and Mr kabarak is certified so we have one two three four five Okay cool so we're good to go I think we're all set Mr uh Pape thank you
can you get us caught up with where we're app sure I'm going to good evening Kenneth Pape on behalf of your applicant Ford plane Partners to all the board members who took the time to go through the prior transcripts thank you on behalf of the applicant and personally appreciate
that this is an application that has been presented to the board substantively it's um three hearing we've been before you a total of five two of them there was just some administrative discussions the presentation um that the board has heard
began last August but the application began 7 years ago the application began with our clients doing a considerable amount of work to be prepared before they came before the board and I wanted to take a little bit of time just to point out some of the things that were
actually done I think the most significant was acquiring a right of way through the KFC property out to Route N9 if that RightWay had not been acquired then the only access to this property would be be from Fort Plains Road we
have I think a th000 ft of Frontage on Fort Plains Road and there is no restriction on our um property having access to Fort Plains Road but it was our client's decision from day one to seek an alternative means of Ingress and erress from the state highway there was
extensive negotiations and that RightWay was purchased and our clients professional team then went down to the Department of Transportation and confirmed that we're permitted to use that right of way access for this property the second thing that they did is they voluntarily gave up their access
to Fort Plains Road you board is aware we're not asking for any access to Ford Plains Road with one exception and that's an exception that Chief Brian proc now Fire official asked and that is to have a single driveway with a knoxbox gate on it that's worked into our
landscape plan strictly for emergency purposes all other access out on the fort Plains Road is denied the during the process of working with the board's professionals the buildings
have evolved considerably the buildings are much smaller than they were originally the building design has changed from what was original the size of the two Flex buildings now although the ordinance does not expressly state that Flex is a permitted use here there
is a flex standard and we went to that Flex standard and as this board has seen over the last couple of meetings the buildings have been revised to be consistent with the flex standards we have historically on this property there are 34 Bungalows those 34
Bungalows are the subject of a court order that was entered last year in the municipal court that court order requires that those be vacated that they The Bungalow Community is to be brought to a conclusion um Mr aguar is not here
this evening um but Mr aguar has been the the the monitor of that constantly asking that we provide an update I was pleased when I got on Friday from Larry lman Esquire Larry Lyman Esquire is the attorney who is
handling the removal of the tenants for Fort plain's partners and on Friday he report he has been keeping me fully apprised of his progress some of the tenants left voluntarily early some left not early but left some
are clients actually assisted in relocating as of Friday of the 34 26 are gone and there are eight that remain the eight that remain unfortunately I'm going to say what our clients have done has been very Humane
to treat the all of the tenants with respect but there there are eight that won't leave and those eight are now the subject of litigation and I um all of the court dates are scheduled for the month of March for for those eight so
the commitment that was made in the Municipal Court the commitment that was REM moralized in a court order uh our clients have diligently pursued it and I would say diligently pursued it in a Humane manner I put a package together for Mr
Howard Mr agar and for Mr Mr Bayer I'm going to with permission I'm going to deliver my package to Mr Bayer now this is a copy of all of the summons and complaints and the court scheduling dates together with an outline of what's taking place is this still letter you emailed
earlier yeah okay thanks when we were here last we were asked to do certain things outside of the this direct process and one of those was I was directed to reach out to Justin yoast Justin Yos as the township
engineer and to ask him what he recommends as a contribution to the traffic signal proposed at the West Farms inter West Farms Road intersection with Fort Plains Road and I did receive his advices and he
indicated that his numbers were not finalized but that he believe that that traffic signal will cost approximately $1,100,000 a lot of money much more than I thought much more than you thought and he came to a conclusion
based on the information that he had that we would have 11% of that what I'm prepared to tell you is this participating along those lines is something that our client is prepared to do if we're fortunate enough to progress
to site plan I'd like to work with Mr yast to actually get those numbers down so that we're not just doing shoot from the hip numbers where was that again the fort planes and Fort planes in West okay right there there's there's discussions about a traffic signal okay excellent
and we were asked if we would participate we said yes we were directed to Mr yoast for a formula he came up with this he did say it's a a formula we accept the concept of making a contribution to the town for that
intersection improvements if we are fortunate enough to progress to site plan I'd like to work out the hard numbers with Justin instead I'm shoot from the HIP number so if I could just depine on that so I think uh we need to settle that as part of the use variance
portion of this application um once the use is approved then we're just talking about site plan related items you know I can tell you I did have a discussion with Mr yuse today and what Mr P represented regarding 11% of 1.1 million is roughly around
120,000 um that I think is what the township is looking for as a contribution towards a future traffic signal at that intersection I think we need to come to like an affirmative agreement on whether or not they're willing to make that contribution tonight because once we get through the use the use is approved and we're just
talking about site plan issues at that point so I think we need definitive Clarity on that yeah very fine it'll take me all of two minutes on the sidebar to to get an answer on that I'll finish my opening and then I'll take that two minutes with
your permission there was also a sewer line that runs through our property that was built by three private property owners it was built by C CME was one the chapter house was the other and the KFC restaurant was the other it has a capacity it's a gravity line that goes
out to Route 9 it has a capacity by according to to the design engineer of what's going through it now plus an additional 300 plus residential units a lot of capacity um that line although it's privately owned will be made available to anyone who's along the
Route n Corridor and wants to tie in my clients are the owners of the easement there are three others who are part of the private ownership any and anyone who ties in is going to be asked to participate in a contribution to cover
portions of the cost again on a prata basis but I'm authorized to say that line exists and it is available to provide sewer to those persons or Property Owners along rout line you just have to be able to get into it when we were here the last there were
a couple of questions of the engineer that required some revisions Mr aguar pointed out that he wanted to see a greater number of TR larger and greater number of closures there were a couple of other comments Mr Lewis ugar is here to present those revisions there is also
a request made to our traffic expert that he consider other traffic generators besides the flex that he had written his report based on so he went and there a new report he went out and looked at all the potential uses that
could be in a flex building and he picked the one that generates the highest traffic and he recalculated and his Mr federi isn't here this evening he is enjoying his daughter at College at parents weekend but his associate um is
here to present those findings there are also some comments with regard to architecture and interior layout of the buildings and Irwin kaisel is here to present and lastly Christine cfone is our planner I just got a text on the way'll be here at
7:45 she just said she said she'll be here at 7:45 and I said please do not speed so driving 100 miles an hour she probably is she's got a little time yeah before we progress to Le if I could just have those two minutes to get a
question on that number can I just get two quick questions um sure just to put on record I don't know Andy if we need to but I know we had an objector show up at turn left yeah if we can just clear that sure so immediately after the last
meeting our clients reached out to the principles that Mr Ronald gazer rowski was representing he put on the record who his client was and our clients reached out to them and they have come to an understanding and I have been told
as just before 5 o'clock today that they have entered into a written agreement there is no objection that's coming from tjf tjf operates a facility a similar facility up further north on 9 and Howell I'm advised that there is no
objection and Mr Gaz rowski and his presentation are withdrawn thank you for that opportunity okay and then the last one was on our site visits we just want to get a Clarity there's a house between the cottages and this property that someone else owns specifically I have
the information here so specifically it's owned by um Natalia Kuro uh she bought it in 2016 it's a multif family that's literally sits on the back back end of your property so we're trying to figure
out what that is because it's not a bungalow it's basically between the cottages and you know this massive land that you're applying here is it okay if I show it to them yeah okay we could bring it up on
no we can't oh you can't no it's on my computer you can't we're going to need to take a recess so B that was in here the other night and they switched cables and not working can we can you give us like five minutes to figure this out yeah Mr Pape wants to also you know make a phone yeah let's take a five minute
break folks the board will now take a five minute break and reconvene at 7:31 p.m. the meeting will now reconvene okay Mr pton yes Mr chair members of the board I had the opportunity to speak to our clients and
also to Mr K and Mr Bayer what our requests is this and I I believe it is acceptable to your professionals that we're agreeing to the 11% of the cost of the signal the cost of the signal right now is being guesstimated when there's a
firm bid package we agree that 11% of what that number is is Our obligation personally I've I've seen traffic signals a number of times and our experience is somewhere between 375 550 is what it comes out to be if it
turns out to be a million one it's 11% of whatever that is the 11% we don't take umage with I do know how Justin came up with it who's the other 89% I guess Justin can only answer that I'm just curious I know so I mean they're
just making their contribution towards a future traffic signal at that intersection so it's based off of traffic they're generating you know calculation and everything like that so uh you know eventually if there's other entities that are also contributing traffic to that intersection they're going to
so what I would say is um you know if the if if the resolution could be awarded uh says something in the effect up to $120,000 or 11% of the actual cost to construct said traffic signal I think that would be appropriate language Ken
do you have an issue with that not at all okay not at all okay Charlie on that issue is there anybody that built recently that has a a contribution that they're going to make and both of those roads Municipal roads or is one of those roads a county and
one's a municipal uh they're both Municipal roads um this is going back a number of years I can tell you uh signalization up at Colts Neck uh Road and Route 33 I want to say was in the 600 700,000 range is my understanding of
it but that was you know s n 10 plus years ago so there's another your other client had committed there was a the project that's being constructed now at the intersection it was a planning board project right at the intersection of Fort Plains and Sunnyside right there
was $800,000 earmarked for roadway improvements at the time I think it was earmarked for Sunnyside I don't mean to talk about your other client but they decided that it was more appropriate to reallocate that towards the signal so there is money that's available for this
signal and the more you know the closer we get to however much it cost what I'm getting the higher probability it's going to go in has there been any grant money from the county no no okay thank you this beam is correct there there was a substantial contribution made by that
other residential project Mr Baro has a question okay we get back to Hi how are you if we get back to that sewer line because you had mentioned so it's a it's privately owned by different entities there's three this goes back to when KFC was approved probably
15 16 years ago and there was no sewer that came out to Route 9 the CME chapter house and the KFC operator got together acquired an easement over our client's property it was owned two two two owners
ago the an easement was sold and the line was designed and approved and it was installed and it's a very substantial gravity line that goes to the sewer line in Fort Plains Road and comes out to Route n it was never taken over by any
government agency the three of them maintain it and but there's lots and lots of room in it in fact 300 residential units worth of room that's left in okay so every so all parties who have ownership to this sewer line are in
are in agreement that other commercial buildings or establishments can tie into that yeah they great do you is that like written somewhere like an agreement that that is that is so yes yeah that it's
it's a private sewer agreement no no but do but do you have written approval from those different entities that what you're saying is in fact what can happen the agreement says people can TI in I don't have a separate agreement other than the original agreement that said
that this was built to this line was built to handle the capacity of 300 plus residential units and the to date they people they've been looking for people to join if you want me to
produce a letter from those entities I have no problem doing it I don't think it's CME any longer because CME sold its business and the people who own the building I don't think are CME but it's the same they not they sold it they sold the building too yes okay then Mr K I
mean so if Mr Pape is representing that all the entities that have an ownership stake in that easement and the private Main in that easement and that they'll consent to anyone in the future being able to connect to that that has Frontage on rout N9 and they can procure that as part of a condition of the
approval I think you know I'll prefer to Andy but I think that would cover us from that perspective they'd be thrilled to have people join no as long as everybody you know sure I'm sorry my mic wasn't on as long as everybody is in agreement who has ownership of that well
if they're prevented from tying in that they wouldn't be able to satisfy a condition of the approval then okay it would fail all right yeah thank you okay Mr pton you want to continue sure surely I think Mr Lewis zner is our
professional engineer he has testified now at the last three hearings I'm I'm sorry did we figure out the house in the middle thing oh we did okay we got so many moving Parts here okay we're we're good okay it's Gilda Radner never
mind never mind it's it's okay different Farmhouse all good to go all right yeah so Mr zner is here to present the additions to the plan that he has added since we were last before you I'll point out that your professional engineer and
planner were kind enough to deliver US Reports indicating they have gone through the these plans we appreciate that they did that we know it was done on short notice um and Lewis Lewis is under under oath I remind him his credentials are part of the record from
the hearing in August he is a professional engineer responsible for the plans if you would if you just give us a quick orientation for all of the board members as to what we're looking at and then identify the additions that have been added to it since the December
hearing certainly good evening uh I'm not sure the exhibit number but this is a document uh stated February 18th prepared by our office it's an update of earlier color renderings that you've seen
a34 I think it's 44 a44 yes no I a34 site rendering prepared by Mid-Atlantic dated February 18th 2025 is that the right one I think I had changed it to a44 I okay messed it up I have a new one up
here Mr Pape if you'd like it that would be lovely thank you thank you if you would certainly so uh we did resubmit documents and plans that I
would call a more complete resubmission than the last time it included more detail and this rendering does show what we've changed but in many ways the way I would describe it is we're not introducing anything new we are addressing certain comments that came out of the last hearing there's no call
it significant change to building or the site in this rendering from what you've seen in the past uh the key revisions that are here and we can go through them uh there was a question on if you remember in the last Edition we changed
the north of Building A1 the yard area to accommodate Fleet parking and some oversized parking spaces and at that time those spaces the deeper larger ones were only 10 ft wide they're now 12 feet wide and that came out of the discussion we had
uh another element around the self storage building we had amended that when we split the site so of course we now have the two uses they're separated there's only an emergency access connection and when we did that we wanted to assure we had sufficient
parking not just overall but on each side so for the Self Storage we created some parallel spaces along the Loop Road those are now 9 ft wide they' been narrower before and we out of that discussion agreed and made those
wider uh that circulation continues to work well another element uh coming from discussions with fire chief uh now these plans do clearly indicate that all of the circulation uh is labeled as fire lane would and that assures that there's
circulation around both the self storage building here and buildings A1 and A2 these fire lanes are identified another key element I think this might have come up in the introduction uh there was a discussion
on trash locations and we have increased the number and the size so they're now five in total four around the flex space areas buildings A1 and A2 uh those could be seen as sort of a light colored
concrete speckled uh area at all four corners uh those are in convenient areas for pickup they would work well those will be masonry enclosures and then there's also one for the self storage building and that's at
the very bottom right of the pl I wanted to make a comment with regard to the Self Storage re trash that's the trash receptacle at a self storage facility is locked otherwise it's going to fill up with people who are throwing their
things away as they're leaving so it's kept locked it is only for the owner everyone who rents from the self storage is given Direct but that's not available to you and I want to point that out which is that's the reason why there's one and not a whole lot of them for that building
correct thank you there are a couple of other elements in this resubmission which really don't appear here but we worked with the architect that you'll hear from later on making sure our plans doors and Overhead Doors all matched um and in terms of plan changes
there might be a few other things to discuss but that's what is is reflected I think that if you could just in December when we came before the board there were some significant changes that have been made based on request made by this board and board Professionals in September the biggest one was the
separation of the two projects so that each would stand alone from a circulation from a drainage and and you can just confirm that you have accomplished that that these each stand alone and that they're not interdependent they do stand alone and
the significant element was uh an enlarged area that's green between the buildings that's obvious in the rendering that would contain a storm water feature but also there would be sort of a a chain but emergency access path for fire emergency vehicles but
that U there'd be no circulation between the two they each have their own entrance we talked before they would each have their own Monument sign and they each have their own access to Highway nine that is correct and only only route nine the other item that we
did presented to you when we were here in December was the buffering and Landscaping increasing buffers and I know that there's comments in the current report that the buffers are the are now adequate in size and at the end of the meeting in December I see sher's
not with us this evening but at the end of the meeting Sher was asked if she was satisfied with the landscape scheme that had been Advanced and she said that she was and we indicated that we would work with her in detail if we progress to site plan but she did indicate that the
concept of that was presented to you was acceptable and one thing I might add is you know sometimes with a parking lot like this if there were parking lot Landscaping that didn't fit within the parking lot but required that would still be incorporated into the perimeter
of this site if I may I learned and I want want Miss beam to I learned from working with this beam and on other industrial projects that sometimes Landscaping the parking lots in industrial areas is not the best idea but you don't get away with it whatever
the Landscaping would have been in the parking lot we're going to have to put it somewhere else on the site we like that concept so if the board allowed a waiver of no Landscaping islands in the parking lots we would calculate that landscaping and find a place around the
perimeter to do it more intensely I think that's all the I have of Mr zner this evening okay those trees are those to be large trees the trees that are at the southern end on
Fort Plains that's an existing Woodland I think we have a BM there don't we there's a there's a substantial burm and we Sher looked at the materials and the the choices and the sizes we gave cart blunch we said as she
directs yeah Charlie and Jen you guys have anything for Mr Zar um yeah so uh Mr zner I think you guys revised your site layout some of the basins at the northeast corner of
the property got smaller in footprint and the elevations changed uh obviously we didn't get a revised STW management report on that but um can you tell us how that's going to work uh if the Basin gets smaller are we going to be having
additional storm water storage volume in the Basin because there's limitations on how much you can have you know below the lower lowest orice and the like and you give us some testimony on that certainly so in particular two basins that are shown here there's a couple others as
well uh among the changes in going to uh the the buildings uh with the one overhead door to each unit uh we went away from the idea of a a lowered loading Bay right these are now at grade overhead
doors so the grading changed where before you can pretty easily imagine that parking was lower than the building floor uh that area has been regraded has come up has changed some of the grading scheme so uh these bases now the top is higher
because the parking lot's higher it changes the shape somewhat but it also allows them to be a little bit deeper so they gain the same volume ultimately of course at site plan we'd have to go through the the full design and again show to Mr conliff that it all
works properly so there's a slight change there uh the volume's still maintained but just slight sort of size element in that shape so would it be accurate to say if this was Advanced to site plan um if
we found an issue with uh you storing too much water in the Basin without discharge below the lowest orice the scale of development would need to be modified comra to comply with the storm water rules you answer from the engineer's
perspective I'll answer for the client uh I I would taking a little bit of a different direction we have to comply with the storm water rules and I'm confident that we can that might need a change to size or shape so might need a retaining wall to gain more volume or
we might need to find volume in a different manner or different location and whatever that result is in the overall site that's what the result would be going to supplement that on behalf of the applicant there are two sets of regulations for storm water management there are the ones that come
from the town's ordinance and there're the ones that come from the D and there is no variance or waiver relief from either so we acknowledge on the record that we must meet the township standards and we must meet the D standards there
is no relief I I think that's satisfactory testimony I just wanted to get you know we don't the board is in the town it's not our interest to Grant waivers or variances from the storm regulations if we found something at time of site plan that the Basin footprint needed to be
bigger to maintain maximum storage depth for the rules they would have to modify the site accordingly and you know Drive aisles could have to move or buildings might have to change foot PR be smaller um I just wanted to get that on the record um I think that's all I have for
Mr zner okay I just wanted the board to know I know shar's not here I did speak to her today she did agree that you have agreed in principle to the things that she has asked but has yet to see it on a plan um
she basically said that she's probably going to ask for additional trees to fill in and kind of beef up where there's holes um but you have plenty of trees to make up for because of the clearing so um she didn't think it was a big ask but she just wanted to make sure
that it was on the record that they've agreed to it in theory but she hasn't seen on a plan yet but if the board is going to act in the affirmative and I'm not 100% sure which direction you guys are going to go and they come back for site plan we can button that up at site
plan and I I'm assuming Lou that when you said that about maybe a retaining wall or increased volume or whatever that's something that you're going to finalize you plan to finalize at site plan if you get over this hurdle tonight that's correct so a full landscape plan and all the storm water reports would be
addressed at site plan and uh just because those two tie together the storm water Bas and work can't go into the buffer they're not I understand that yeah well yeah 100% % nothing can go in the buffer I don't have anything else yet
any board members have anything from Mr zner no Mr Mr is your traffic expert here tonight yes yes he is your traffic expert yeah um Nick fesi is not his
associate who work okay so I'll hold my question okay thank you there is one question that we have for the board and I don't know whether you want to answer it now or at a later time but we do not have sidewalks along Fort Plaines and we don't have sidewalks on The Limited
piece of property that we have on Route N9 we do know that if you don't put in sidewalks there's a $7 per linear foot contribution for the into the sidewalk contribution we'd be very interested in knowing either now or sometime in the
future whether you'd like to see us add the sidewalks or write the check I either n we want to see sidewalks right sidewalk on nine yeah sidewalk on nine at a very minimum sidewalk on nine I mean we've been very diligent about creating that comprehensive sidewalk
Network we've already got a couple there that we've and you know the bus runs up and down and when there's no sidewalk if you look at an AA view you can see a dirt path where people walk so sidewalk on nine is critical it's up to you with respect to what you want on four planes
I mean that road is not super safe and there isn't sidewalk along it but like maybe it's time to start creating a sidewalk Network I mean
not that long ago I think it was like two or three months ago a little kid was hit on a bike not that far from where this comes out onto four Plains Road because there's no sidewalk it there's very minimal shoulder so it's some it's up to you guys on Fort Plains but I
definitely would advocate for sidewalk on nine but how long how much sidewalk is actually how much Frontage is on actual Route 9 it's pretty minimal correct but it's going to connect to sidewalk as properties develop right so
you have all those little houses that are now in a Redevelopment area that were encouraging to redevelop you get sidewalk there then KFC comes in for a new site plan that gets sidewalked CM just sold their building there's going to be a new user there there's going to
be sidewalk we have to keep getting it even if it's minimal because otherwise you have people walking on the shoulder of Route 9 and it's not safe and the bus routes on Route 9 are significant I know we just did it across the street 100% any Frontage on Route 9 I'm going to
advocate for sidewalk because people are walking it's not you know I was like oh it's route n people don't walk that is absolutely not true they absolutely walk to get onto the bus I walk on Route 9 and there's no sidewalk where I walk so I agree with you right 100% yeah so I think so it's up to you on Fort Plains
but on Route N I would 100% advocate for it I think the planned answer would be route n for sure and we'll have to disc we just want you to know that we're aware that there's an ask in the staff reports we're amenable to whatever Direction you send us trees where people go up the road
down a curve there and if you put sidewalks more people Tom is your mic on no no now it's on yeah yeah I don't recommend sidewalks over there because I
think it' be too dangerous and we defer to you and we know that's just my opinion because where are you saying now on Fort Plains Road defitely you know we have that curve there's so many trees over there that get run into and crashed and people
walk at their dogs and stuff they're especially if it's in the winter and and it's icy there they're going to get hit well they're safer if they're on a side walk then if they're in the shoulder because that's where that's where people are well if they're foolish enough to walk on the shoulder they are walking
there that's not if they they but they have a sidewalk on the opposite side it doesn't matter they're they're they're walking you have to wait you have to wait well that's just my opinion we could argue about it yeah maybe this is something the board maybe you hear from the public and then you come to some
kind of determination on it and just to give the board some context so the frontage on four planes is at at least 2700 linear feet so And to clarify clle Ken point so the contribution it's it's $7 per square foot of sidewalk just to
put Clarity on it so but is it per square foot or per linear foot um I'll we'll confirm it but I'm I'm pretty sure it's per square foot I thought ity which is around 63 65 bucks a square yard um but that's what's in the ordinance
so okay actually I do have a question for Mr zner um my mic's on good um outside of this um application or the or the Acres being used for this application how much of the
remaining um land is um developable so the total property is 34 acres and and this sort of window of development we're looking at is 14 acres um and I could try and pull it up
the remainder is significantly impacted by floods and buffers there is along Fort Plains that's outside of those areas but not much and I could go back and see where the Bungalows are where the Bungalow up where the
Bungalows are has been Disturbed and it's not in the wetlands or the flood planes but other than that it's almost exclusively constrained okay thank you nothing else and continue on Mr P thank you I'm going to ask if our
architect could return to present his revisions thank you good evening I remind you that you're under oath and I remind the board that Mr Kell's credentials were placed on the record he was established as an
architect in an area of expertise um he was charged with coming up with some revisions and supplemental information on his plan set I'm going to ask if you could give us an outline of those revisions and take us through them
using the exhibits that have been recently filed so if we could go to the um the latest exhibit uh for uh the architectural plans which I
believe is a12 date last Revis 10524 uh this this consists of several drawings elevations and floor plans and this represents uh you know the latest drawings what we had to do so what we're
now looking at is are the are the two Flex buildings U just to bring you back uh to where we were we didn't change the square footage of the buildings building A1 is
71,0 8871 Square ft the the the grading was changed somewhat so B based on the the ordinance per definition the height of this building is 31
ft with respect to building A2 uh the total square footage including the mezzanine is 7381 square ft and based on the ordinance's definition is 32 9
in now when we look closely at coordinating the uh I'm sorry can can we just interrupt for one second can you give us the date again on the plans that you're referring to we just want to make sure we're using the right set 105 10:15
that's right 10:15 and then you submitted a color rendering as part of this latest submission right correct okay correct so when we looked at the plans closely for the for the two Flex buildings we found that stairways that
the finished floor elevations of the flex building did not not quite uh were were higher than the grading of the adjacent parking so what we needed to do is we raise the sidewalks so it it's
there's no step to enter uh the different storage units within the space so since uh we raised the sidewalk there will be a retaining wall on the on the automobile on the parking lot side of
the of the wall to uh accommodate the changes in grade as you may know there's a significant uh change in grade of of this Flex of the two Flex buildings it
drops significantly and as such we have several different elevations of sidewalk because we have several different elevations of flex space so uh so in term we adjusted doors we made sure
every space had uh restrooms and we generally coordinated uh our drawings with the with the civil engineers drawings uh there were some elevators we don't need elevators we took them
out um but other than that the configuration and we know that each uh space has one overhead door on on the route n side and there's no loading dock it's it's trade in so basically that's
those are the changes to uh to the fle the two Flex buildings now Mr kaiso just to clarify so the October 15th those are the latest and greatest revised architecturals that you submitted not the renderings but the
actual floor plans and all that kind of stuff um wait a sec um 105 yeah October 15th no those are not the latest actually can can I step closer to the
board I was looking yeah because I'm pretty sure we had brought up the issue with some of the units not having bathrooms or stairwells to the mezzanine and things like that so there there should be a later version correct here I apologize
[Applause] the I I'm sorry the latest state is February 13 2025 those are the drawings that you should have I think that's what you have up there yes just it's hard to read
that I I have large versions but yeah that these are the drawings they're dated all dated 23 February 13 2025 correct okay yeah the right Mark Charlie yeah I apologize for misstating I was
submitted as part of the last yeah yeah we w we presented the right drawing we just called out the date he was calling out the date the last revision that's what I had pulled up which is in the most current I was reading off of the you know the exhibit list I'm sorry
so so what I was uh addressing was the were the sidewalks in front of the building and due to what we've done is we've aligned the sidewalks with the finished floor elevations of the
respective uh Suites and as such because there are num there are several different finished floor elevations we needed the sidewalks to uh to be aligned with the Finish floor of of The Suite so we've
done that in uh buildings A1 and A2 we haven't changed Square footages we haven't changed Suite Dimensions we refine those the sizes on previous on previous
drawings um where you see a a vertical solid line on the uh drawings that represents a change in grade uh of the finished floor elevation so for example this building which is A1
will have two two different floor elevations whereas um A2 will have um four different floor elevations so and just to clarify so so you're talking when you say the sidewalk
adjacent to the building it's on the West Side the for planes Frontage where the actual office component is access from the parking space so you're telling me there's a retaining wall in between the sidewalk and the parking area there yes and what's the maximum height of
that retaining wall for our reference well the height of the retaining wall is going to be uh up to 42 in uh it's going to act as a guard rail too potentially so it'll be 42
in above um above the grade of this the finished elevation of the sidewalk yeah so so it's 42 in so 3' 6 Ines higher at the as you go to the north it goes from
at grade up to 42 in above the adjacent parking right but the parking yes but the parking is sloped so it'll start lower and then it'll get higher as the as the yeah so this the sidewalk is flush with the curb height at the south
end and then the retaining wall gets higher as the parking area gets lower okay so and if this is Advanced to site plan the applicant would get any necessary building permits as far as for the retaining wool and comply with fencing requirements and everything like
that as required before we go there I want to see what this looks like yeah because you know aesthetically I'm not interested in a 42inch retaining wall up against a building with some kind of guide rail on
top of it like I I don't know what exactly so what is it going to look like it'll it will be a decorative uh CM a block retaining wall split face block retaining wall and is there going to be something on top of
it a rail a rail it'll have a like a guide rail like you see on the highway no no no a decorative half ra do you have a detail not not with me right now you didn't submit a detail with this no we did not I I am not opining on this until I see what it's going to look like
because honestly I think that every time we come here there's one little new thing but we don't have all the new stuff and so I don't know why you would this would be on the plans without a detail I don't understand why you would do that
and I I mean I'm not interested in this looking more industrial than it already looks well I get it but I'm just saying typically we have ballards and so I'm not saying you can't put the retaining wall but I don't know
why you would provide this on the plans without giving us a detail of what it's going to look like because people are going to be able to see this yes yes so so therefore that's important so can we go to sheet a 5.1 which has the
elevations of the uh uh and if you could Z zoom in on for example uh drawing number one at the top of the sheet which is uh the front elevation of the building well so where's the rail
where's the guide rail well right now what we've done for the sake of this presentation is we've shown the top of the wall to be where the top of the guide rail would be but right but what it's showing is it looks wall which makes it look nice a
guil is not attractive so you're showing just block that's not what you're going to actually install if this gets approved and so you're asking us to alline on something that's not actually being shown on the plans well that's
what I'm suggesting here is that this is our current design which is decorative block um to protect the sidewalk so what we're saying is the front of the building will have a decorative block retaining wall that goes up to the
required height of 42 in but you just said literally two minutes ago that there's going to be some kind of guide rail up there that's not shown on your plan I think that what I think there's a handrail on top and I think what win
said was that this wall would function as a guy gril not that there would be a guy gril on top of I appreciate interpretation but that's not exactly what he said yes so that's what I intended to say so so what the what the rendering appears to show is that you
know you have the retaining wall that's higher obviously than the adjacent parking area but then the retaining wall also extends higher than the sidewalk which Services the manand doors to the office base but you're saying that the retaining wall is going to extend 42 in above the concrete sidewalk into the
building so it acts as a retaining wall but also as like a a barrier from The Pedestrian way so you're not falling off the end of a a retaining wall it almost serves as like a dual purpose it's a wall and a handra exactly exactly okay all right so you know I still think
there needs to be a detail I'm sorry I mean respectfully the testimony has not been consistent so I'm not I understand what you're saying now but you're not showing it and you're not providing a detail
and honestly the and that and then that rendering that you're showing is not compliant with our architectural standards at all so you know there's work to be done on this architecture if the board is going to
move this forward in the affirmative the architecture is going to need to change we we've Miss beam we've read your comments we accept them and we would be very pleased to work with you to satisfy
both uh the municipal uh requirs I can I appreciate that but let's be clear my letter is planning review number six so it hasn't been rectified since the summer we're now basically in
March I would have expected at least something attempting to comply between summer and March planning review number six my architectural comments have been consistent throughout and we're still
here so I appreciate your willingness to work with us but understand my frustration in the fact that it's yet to have happened that's not typically how this process works so this should in my opinion this is something that should
have been dealt with up to before now so you could take that for what it is but I'm not I'm not satisfied with the architecture as of now it's not not compliant and it's had months and months and months and months to become
compliant and we're still where we are yeah and you know I know there was testimony that the architectural has been revised to comply with the you know to agree with the site plan but I'm looking at the site plan and the grading
plan and I'm not seeing where it's indicating a retaining wall adjacent to the parking on the site plan or with the grading so um we would want to see that clarified too it's I can see it on the architectural and based on the representation they made it seems
apparent and clear but it doesn't come across that way on the on the site plan and and the grading plan certainly we're not seeing access to that sidewalk either we see this long retaining wall which is several hundred
feet no access I imagine in some areas you're even going to need steps to go up no steps the purpose of the of the wall and the rais sidewalk is to eliminate the need for steps that's the entire purpose of
uh of this so where would you access the sidewalk if you're parking in those head-on spots in front of that retaining wall where would you be accessing the I don't see any access in this elevation well the access [Applause]
re let me so referring to she a1.1 there um there is an access point just to the left of the island just to the left of
the island that's shown on that plan that would be the access point to the suits to the left so you have to walk down the drive aisle through the whole length of the building to then get into the sidewalk at that one Island that's the that's the current
configuration and so and where's the Ada spots I would that has to be coordinated with the uh with the simple drawings this this you know this is subject to submission of uh of the a formal site plan should we get to that
point is that compliant with fire egress too from the the last building in front of the wall if I need to get out the building the the buildings comply with fiery gr with the wall with the wall so if I'm in a wheelchair and
I'm in the last building I have to wheel all the way uphill from a wall no the the sidewalk is flat there's no that's the entire point of these sidewalks they are completely flat level with the finished floor of
the building wall changes just the height of the wall changes due to the height of the wall is uniform the gray changes the the the parking lot is sloped correct so the the the parking the the sidewalk is like you
said flush with the finished floor of the the building correct and this is was our solution to bridge the difference the grade differences associated with his site so to I guess to Mr Ryan's question right so if you're at the
northernmost unit in each one of these areas where there's a retaining wall you have to walk in the EV event of a fire 150 ft adjacent to the building that's on fire just to get away from the building whatever the whatever the distance is
yes because I think it's a different yeah why wouldn't we just put ballards up instead of a wall yes is there some I guess I guess Mr Pape if if Mr zugner obviously we're going to
request that he come back to the mic is there some engineering design requirement that requires this retaining wall here for grading or any kind of other issue so so Mr Z's back on his feet and
testify why don't you use this mic right here so everyone hears you so I and I think what's uh the element here is finding the right route for Ada access into the building and uh
typically that's a very sort of detailed fine Step of specific grades where those spaces go they have to be at the right slope these buildings are a little bit more difficult because of the grade change uh and this was introduced as a means uh of getting a path into each of
these offices uh it was my expectation because we do have excess parking spaces that when we came back at site plan we might reconfigure where we put islands in the different parking spaces to create more access to
the sidewalk shorten these sort of sidewalk ramps uh and then find where it was a combination of ramps and steps so effectively what this element of the plan is is the handicap ramp into the office buildings uh does need some work
in ter terms of creating more points of access through moving islands around are you comfortable that you can do what you just describe so and as Mr kof said our plan doesn't have all of this grading included at the moment um
it would be very fine and detailed sort of steps throughout the process I did look at it throughout uh this past week in terms of how you could get access to each of these offices uh I believe your ordinance says uh something about access to the sidewalk walk is it every 63 ft
every 65 ft um and when I looked at it we would probably be further apart than that but that you would have access uh from handicap spaces onto the ramp uh you know about every 10 spaces um so you would need to separate out and create
Islands about every 10 spaces for Access into that and then you would also have at the other ends steps so you wouldn't always be walking that full distance if you went up steps you'd be closer if you went up the ramp from the other side it' be a little further so bottom line is I have looked at it it can be done it does
need some work to achieve it in terms of getting sufficient access while you're on your feet the other side of the building has an overhead door and some man doors what's the ACC in the event of a of a fire or other emergency what is
the ability to act erress the building on that side so from these parking spaces to the other side where there's a man door and Overhead Door out into the other side of the yard the building's level inside so you would walk straight through the building you could go out
either end and in fact you could um you know effectively if you needed adaa access through one of the service vehicles or trucks you'd be coming in through that overhead door on the other side that end it's just flat going right out to
the overhead doors are at grve they're not loading docks that's correct so these walkways then if you're at different levels and I know these are individual units but if someone's going to go from this unit here to this unit they got to walk out into the parking
lot and then back into one of these elevated walkways I believe it's every three units there's a step in grade of some distance is there a step though within that or is it blocked off and you have to go out and around so and I'm not sure right where we are here but if if this line on the left here where the
island is if you imagine that's the step of a couple of feet the walk way would continue but the Ada access would not so if you came out one to get to the next you would go up steps I'm maybe maybe it's the wrong place for it but I'm still not understanding why we need a wall there I
was just think so so in this particular oh okay cuz the sidewalks elevated above the parking lot so so the building finished floor is at 113 the parking area in this picture slopes from right to left downgrade and it's you know roughly flush on the right hand
side and then there's multiple feet of fall as you go down the parking area so here the wall might be four feet high above the parking area here it might be flush um is your Mr Zar were you when you said stairs as another were you
saying that stairs could be added here I in so right in my belief the sidewalk Contin but you would need stairs and that on the parking lot side of anywhere above whatever the elevation requirement is there would be a handrail it would be
like you rungs in a railing um so to me this is more a handicap ramp into the building the Aesthetics I assume would tie into the building uh but it's more than just a handicap ramp where you'd have exposed concrete it needs some decorative work
that would match the base of the building yeah I mean I guess the question and I I don't know if obviously everything gets circulated to the fire buau I don't know if they were like aware that there was going to be like a retaining wall on
that long of a ramp uh I get you say there's the rolling doors on the other side of the building and people can walk out of there but if there's trucks parked in front of that for loading and unloading and there's a fire like you know I'm looking at the dimension here 53 and A2 53 and A2 54 and A2 you know
you're looking at anywhere from like 130 to 150 ft if you're in this unit in a fire that you have to walk next to a building that's potentially on fire before you can get away from the building is the is the loading Bays also on obviously if that's the Contour of the land do they go straight in or do
they have ramps up and down and it so again on the other side that's why there's larger islands the parking lot sort of drops at different steps but the loading Bay is flat like there's direct access funny Mr chairman yes sir
steps you got your mic there Tom you know wheelchair if you're going down the sidewalk wouldn't slopes be better in steps or I could if you imagine and there's many accesses like this maybe even out front here where there's an area that ramps in
for handicap access and a separate area for steps in so here would be along the face of the building you might come from one side on the ramp uh but from the other side where the grade's lower you would come up steps so if you chose to use steps you could come in on steps if you needed to take the ramp you could
come in the other direction on a ramp so there would be a ramp for the uh wheelchairs to use end steps correct okay any more questions anyone Jen do you have any no
okay no thank you I'm gonna ask if you could continue and I think we also would like to discuss this we have to discuss the self storage building design and also signage you
could yes first to if we can go to the elevations of the self storage building which would be sheet A7 that was [Applause]
submitted can we go to sheet a A7 if you have an opportunity so we've attempted to improve on the um the the design of this of the self
storage building we read Miss beam's letter we understand that it's still not satisfactory but I would still like to explain uh how we address the elevations and basically these this
approach addresses all four sides of the building where what we've done is we've increased the scale of the windows and we've Incorporated horizontal and vertical elements in the building to to
give it a smaller scale so there's there's the lowest level of the building will be split face block which is a decorative block the tan level uh is uh represented
by horizontal siding materials that that again give it a uh a smaller scale appearance and the top of the building which we talked about last time is a mansard a mansard which is a sloped
element that looks like a roof with vertical uh lines down the front of it interrupted by Dormers so what this does is is again it gives it a less industrial
appearance and it also breaks up the building both vertically and horizontally and as I and to the left of the north elevation is where we've indicated the proposed sign location
so as I've explained the elevations of the building and the adjustments we've made to the storage building I like to address our intent for signage so starting with the flex building which we're
on uh we're showing on the drawings near the entrance uh a 124x 44 long uh identification sign that would be the brand identification of the of the operator of
the storage facility that amounts to 547 Square ft we believe that represents 9% of the first floor facade per the ordinance per our understanding of the
ordinance uh this building will also have a monument sign it's not shown on the current engineering drawings but it will be placed in conj in accordance with the code with the zoning ordinance
requirements with respect to the flex building this will also have a monument sign that identifies the name of the building which name we don't have right now we're also proposing um a 4X 15 or 60 square ft
each sign for each tenant that will occupy the building and if you go to the elevations of the flex building those those signage areas are represented by
the dotted lines near the top that's not a final location but that's what we've shown now we have indicated uh nine nine signs on this on the building eight so building A1 has
seven signs which correlates with seven potential tenants building A2 has nine signs and that was inadvertent on our part our intent is to have eight signs one for each tenant of the
building um so that corresponds to the need for each tenant to have some form of identification and if I didn't say it before the flex building will also have a monument sign at the entrance but that Monument sign which is not now shown
will comply with the requirements of the sign ordinance of Howell Township in addition to that there will be a one way finding sign for the two Flex buildings and one W wave finding sign for the uh
South storage building you've acknowledged that there are comments in the staff reports that the architectural elements of both of these buildings not satisfactory to the board's professionals and if you could
you have to talk louder oh I'm sorry if you would acknowledge that in the staff reports that were generated on these versions of the plans there's an indication that the architectural treatment of both of these buildings is not yet acceptable is not yet compliant
with the ordinance and if you could reaffirm that you you're agreeing to work with the township to accomplish accomplish that we would be happy to work with the township to accomplish the architectural
requirements and desires for the appearance of these two buildings these three buildings now think I if I may say I I think you know I don't I don't I don't want to dissatisfy the
board and the planner with regard to the design of the buildings instead what we've done is instead of trying to start a new and create a new architectural design for the facades of these buildings we've
attempted to change the buildings as designed and uh come up with new Solutions but I am pleas I would be very pleased to start the the facade designs from scratch reread the ordinance look
at the requirements and come up with uh designs that are uh in keep keeping with the zoning ordinance and uh that would give me uh I would be very happy to do that I have nothing further of our
architect look to the board and board's Professionals for examination anybody on the board have questions for it can can we just take a look at the elevation where the the loading side is
the loading Bay Side is so you mentioned that the the pavement if I heard correctly the pavement in front of those loading doors is going to be level correct unlike the other side where it slopes correct so then it will step down
correct you're going to have it yes so in looking at that drawing you see a vertical line kind of 2third of the way from right to left there's a vertical line that repres that represents the change in grade at the building so on
the right we have a low finished floor height to the left we have a higher finished floor and that was reflected on the floor plan so as to how that transitions I would defer to the Civil drawings to the final to the design the site plan design
should have go that far you know I would defer to the Civil drawings for how to transition that but what you see here you see on the right side there's three overhead doors and three person doors and they're all walking at gr so there's
no Step at all um from the from the route n side of this building it just you just walk in uh to the straight with no steps approximately how much does that step down in that one spot right there
approximately let me put my glasses on if I'm looking at the right one it's about six feet so right here we're talking about right 80% of that door next to it that could be as as that could be six
feet so now you're going to will you need another retaining wall will run perpendicular from the building well a as we heard earlier uh as we go into the site plan design of
this a closer look will be taken to the to the uh grading of this site and I believe as I as I look at this if if you go to sheet the the sight rendering sheet there's a there's a dark line
there's several dark lines that are perpendicular to the to the building and I believe those represent retaining walls to transition between the different levels of the building I've asked that Mr zner come up again um and
explain how that side of the building transitions from each of the levels sure um and I would note that this sort of element with these larger islands this has been part of the plan and for some time so this is not a changing but
doesn't mean that it's clear to everyone uh so there's sort of two elements here in that Island there is a wall uh which Mr kaisel was talking about that would separate the two steps in the building and then there's also grading in the islands so in that Island
it's effectively like a steep drop or segment from one level to another then as you get into the yard area um the concrete it's flat across the building it's slightly sloped out in the parking but then as a vehicle comes to each of those Island areas there's like a you
know sort of a drop in the parking lot it gets steeper then flattens back out but that's sort of spread out across the parking lot so it's not a you know a drivable drop so you've probably seen that before like if you're in a you know car garage or something
relatively flat you go down a ramp to the next section thank you more questions from the board okay i' like to take three minutes to uh to consult here so
I the board will now take a five minute break and reconvene at 8:45 the meeting will now reconvene all right uh Mr P we just took a break so we wanted to talk with uh with Mr Jackson real quick Sur thank you Mr chairman if we could carry
645 o Glenn okay uh what do we have Miss Eileen for our friend here 2026 I think we'll get him in a little bit before half [Music]
um March I mean I'll just give you the list March 10th I have four applicants on um March 24th I have Mr ape for use variance to go first April 7th I have four applications on is it the Mr papes
one only one that night or uh well he's requested to go first and since it's a used variance nobody wants else wants to go what what case is it C it's gateway gateway April 14th would be good if you
have that no I have I could do April 28th that works I have nothing scheduled okay that works is that okay Mr Jackson yes and we'll wave the time period until then I'll confirm that in writing if it's applicable thank you thank you get a extension of expiration yes we will
provide take care of that okay yes all right thank you sir thank you for the courtesy of letting me come up have a good night thank you good night good night good night night John thank you for your Indulgence Mr Pape surely okay I think we had no do we have any
questions for the Professionals for uh architect we're we're good sir okay all right Mr P we can my only comment with regard to the architecture is that we recognize that there's work to be done and um we would hopefully have the ability to progress to a pych plan and
every one of the questions every issue that Miss beam and this board has brought to our attention will be addressed to your satisfaction I think we have a I think we have a long history of of satisfying as being in this board on architecture okay with your
permission I'm ready to go to the third professional Witness thank you yep okay our traffic expert this evening is Patrick Downey Patrick is with the um Nicholas fesi and was involved in the
research that was done to prepare the revised report he hasn't testified before this board so we're could take a few moments to have him sworn and then we'll share his credentials with report very good do you swear that the testimony you'll give will be the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth
the help yes I do state your name for the record and spell your last please sure Patrick Downey d w NE y Mr Downey take a few minutes to share with the board and the public your professional and educational background sure um I have a Bachelor of
Science degree in civil engineering from Rowan University I'm a licensed professional engineer in the state of New Jersey as well as Pennsylvania certified professional traffic operations engineer principal with Dynamic traffic with uh going on 10 years of traffic engineering expertise uh I haven't had the pleasure of
testifying before this board before but I've testified before dozens of other boards throughout New Jersey is your license in good standing on this date yes it is Mr chairman I'd respectfully ask that you allow Mr Downey to testify as a traffic engineer this evening we do accept his credentials and I would like
to take one quick pause here new with the chairmanship anybody that may still be sitting in the audience for uh ba 2118 for or uh that's you guys I'm sorry uh ba 1926a Oak Glenn has been uh moved
to April 28th just in I'm sorry yeah it's oh it's carried yes it's moved to April 28th so anybody that's in the audience for that just so you know okay I'm sorry Mr P you no problem at all I'm
going to ask if you could identify what the responsibility of your firm was based on the comments from the board at the December M meeting what additional work that you carried out confirm that that work was memorialized in a report
and then if you could provide us with a summary of what that report identified absolutely uh so as you alluded to traffic testimony was previously provided uh at at least two hearings uh at the last meeting we were tasked with three homework assignments to further review three specific items uh those
were to review any additional area developments that have been approved uh since the preparation of the original traffic impact study uh and include them in the background traffic of our analysis number two uh was to confirm the trip generation projections for the proposed Flex Warehouse uh based upon
the it rates that are available uh and to take the most conservative uh to model the worst case scenario and third was to review any potential impact on the intersection of West Farms Road and Fort Plains Road uh we've done those three things we submitted a supplemental traffic assessment dated February 6th 2025 uh
that outlined the results of those three items and Summarize each of them now we could do them one at a time and and tell us which one you're doing first sure uh so I'll start with the area developments uh we further coordinated with Township staff uh to ascertain any
other developments that have been approved but not yet fully constructed and occupied as of the date of the traffic accounts that were collected uh three additional developments were identified uh each of them residential in nature uh totaling over 1,200 units or so uh those have all been included in
the background traffic and the analysis and the analysis in the original traffic impact study has been recalculated accordingly can you share with us what your conclusions were did your findings change measurably when you added in the additional 12200 units they have not uh
the exact levels of service and delays are summarized in that traffic assessment uh but based upon our right in right out access to Route 9 only uh still good levels of service and delays are projected for our access points uh there's really no material difference uh in results uh because really what what the traffic impact analysis studies the
relative impact of this project relative to predevelopment conditions if you could tell take us to the second topic the second obligation that you have sure uh so that was to review the trip generation projections for the flex warehouse space uh The Institute of Transportation Engineers or
it trip generation rates uh form the basis for Dot's accepted rates uh and they segregate their data into what they call land use codes uh so we reviewed each of the land use codes that could theoretically be applicable for this type of flex Warehouse use uh there were four of them in total uh we reviewed
each of their applicability and ultimately took the one that yielded the highest trip generation projections so it's really a worst case scenario not even necessarily the most representative but the worst case conservative uh version so when we talk about the proposed trips model in the updated traffic analysis it's using that more
conservative land use code and I remind the boy there was a a specific question is there another way of measuring the traffic because there's something that could be done that's more intense and Nick did indicated that he would go back to see if there were anything that was more intense than what he used for the
the flex Warehouse so in fact you did find at least one use that was more intense than the flex correct and you used that and ran the analysis again that's correct would you share with the board the conclusions that were reached as they're memorialized in your report
yep same as stated before no material change from the original traffic analysis both the additional area developments and these higher drip generation projections for our proposed use uh were included in the updated analysis and levels of service question
yes how do you come to these conclusions without knowing the types of businesses that will be in the flex facilities we go ahead sure uh so the way it comes up with their rates not just for this use but ever use that could have uh you know multiple
different tenants that fall under that classification uh it's empirical traffic count thata so they actually go study existing sites of the similar type of use similar ranges of tenants uh do on the ground traffic counts um aggregate all that data and come up with rates
that can be applied to Future projects accordingly and you found four categories that could possibly be applicable to a flex building and chose the one that created the most traffic correct we specifically chose that one to model the worst case thank you you're
welcome thank you and your third responsibility yes so that was to um take a look at the intersection of West Farms Road and Fork Plains Road uh really in terms of what traffic volumes from our proposed development would be expected to use uh that intersection or travel through it during the peak hours
as was stated before we have no direct access to for planes so that certainly helps in that regard uh but based on the route 9 access alone uh and the anticipated trip distribution uh we're projecting 20 Vehicles traveling through that intersection associated with this project during the highest peak hour of
the week so to put that in perspective it's about one vehicle every 3 minutes in the busiest hour uh where every other hour of the week would be less uh it's far below New Jersey Do's threshold what they would consider to be significant which is 100 peak hour trips one fif of
that threshold uh So based on that it's our opinion there will be no perceptible traffic impact at that intersection resulting from this development and not withstanding that conclusion you have the commitment from your applicant to participate in a
traffic at 11% of whatever the big package is I think that concludes this what your report was required to address yes that's correct I have nothing further Mr D okay
Charlie and Jen any questions so I don't I don't take any issue with any of the representations that were made um I think one of the the sticking points at the last hearing and what we wanted to hear more information on is uh a more finite number of what
was going to be a contribution towards a traffic signal at West Farms and for Plains um I think during some of the public comments at the last hearing you heard concerns about uh The Jug Handle at West Farms and uh route n to go if
you're exiting the site coming southbound to go north on Route n you have to use that Jug Handle and you know what does that look like during the peak hour and and and people potentially making the right on to West Farms and the right on to Fort Plains to go all the way up to Burgerville to utilize the
light there um you know that 11% or the 120,000 that was discussed earlier um you know that was discussed with the township engineer Justin Yos and um you know I think that uh goes towards resolving that concern um that was
brought up by the public um I don't take any exception to any of the other testimony that's been provided far Miss beam anything yeah no I don't have an issue at all with what the testimony was the only thing I just want to bring up is that as you guys know
that intersection Route 9 and West Farms has been quite a problem lately I guess it was what last week two cars crashed into each other and burst into flames so you know there's been quite a number of major major accidents at that
intersection so you know it's just I I get it you're not causing the problem but just adding volume is concerning because that inter I don't know what about that intersection causes so many problems but there's like a major
accident there like every other week looks like I notic that okay thank you any uh board members have anything for traffic y okay Mr Ryan Mr Downey the traffic survey that
you did is showing the impact of the facility with additional traffic coming off Route N9 yeah so the two intersections analyzed in terms of level of service and delay are the two uh driveway intersections along Route 9 so essentially ensuring those driveways can operate efficiently and the driveway
that is for the um first building right off Route n not the flex buildings but the storage y um how much space is there between the EG off of Route 9 to where the deceleration
Lane going into Home Depot is because it looks like they overs on the the drawings the um exact distance to that lane I'm not positive I know the separation to the next driveway down the road is about 250 ft or so with the
transition being Home Dep correct and with the transition for the lane being somewhere in that space um it's something dot always looks at with scrutiny during their reviews and their requirement is to be outside the full w of the turn lane at a minimum um so we can certainly commit to satisfying that because that will be their uh
requirement if it is located partially within the transition that is permitted by dot uh not just for this project but in general along State highways so as the traffic is building on Route 9 as it will do going forward into to time that does that become a tough turn trying to
exit the property uh over time assuming background traffic continues to increase uh yes and not just for this intersection but all um as part of our analysis you know that's really the purpose of kind of facet one of what I spoke about earlier is getting an idea
of what the expected growth is in the foreseeable future and then also applying in addition to that uh dot rates for what they project traffic to build uh on an annual basis moving forward okay and and in this section of Route n currently what is the cars per hour
there so obviously varies by peak hour in the three that we have analyzed morning uh evening and Saturday uh about 1,200 2,000 and 1,600 in the southbound Direction only our side of the highway so three
hours is that just cars or is that including trucks uh total vehicles in yeah would you say the numbers one more time just for clarity and Portion each one to a time sure uh actually this so I'm referring to in the updated traffic
assessment uh dated February 6th figure two uh morning evening and Saturday peak hours being 1,200 close to 2,000 and close to, 1600 uh in each of those three hours respectively okay it's roughly about
2,000 a peak would be Carl yes thank you very much Mr Mor you have something yes um I'm just looking and and I understand it's not drawn to scale but the Architects
rendering um showing the the drive the Ingress egress for the flex space um traffic going in and out um I think it was testimony of the last
traffic engineer that a uh WB 67 uh tractor trailer would be able to get in and out of um the um the complex I'm just
looking and a WB 67 exiting onto Route 9 South um did you look at will that truck drive or have to move into two lanes of traffic in order to make that
turn coming out so at the location of that driveway um it's prior to the opening of the third lane so there's a very wide shoulder it effectively increases your turning radius for a truck uh so that wide shoulder actually goes a long way to making that turn easier I don't know if Mr Downey is
aware that his that Nick went to the do and got the driveway radi redesigned specifically to accommodate an articulated tractor trailer so the the new in intersection of the KFC drive
with route n will be rebuilt specifically to have turning radius that makes certain that the tractor Trail if it's coming out and we don't anticipate that there'll be many we're not targeting them but if one came out it would go into the first Lane and we can
make that commitment that was done with the dot two years ago and is there a deceleration will there be a deceleration Lane going into that um entrance there will not be
a dedicated deceleration Lane for the driveway itself the radii would accommodate turns but there would not be an additional Lane um the additional volume particularly the volume of tractor trailers would just be nowhere near what's required to Warrant a dedicated turn
lane Mr conliff you know I can't apply on something that we don't have or seen in front of us um it is the Dos right away in their access so they're going to you know review I imagine this is a major access permit for this yes correct yes so
they're going to review the geometry and require any modifications that they need need to have the applicant demonstrate that the aess can satisfy their requirements um and that's going to be made a condition of any board
approval um if that's something that you feel like you want to see as a board I mean you could certainly request it but you know that's something that typically on this kind of instance falls under Dot's jurisdiction okay thank you anybody
else no no no all right thank you thank you sir the fourth and final professional witness this evening is Christine Kone Christine as other Witnesses shared is
is under oath shared her credentials with the board and is qualified as a professional planner I'll re remind Miss Kone that she is under oath and I know that having heard this additional testimony and at our request she just
prepared to do a summation of the planning argu the planning basis for granting the relief that we're asking of this board yes so good evening for the record Christine Kone acknowledging that I am in fact still under oath from the last
hearing where I did provide all of my direct testimony and the planning testimony was complete but given the fact that we've made some plan changes um we thought it would be best if I came back and just did a a summary plus it's been a minute since we've been here on this so um a couple of things right
we're in an HD1 Zone which I think at the last hearing what I did was I read into the record many of those uses permitted in the HD1 Zone just to remind us that what we're dealing with is is a permissive commercial site right this is not well we need a use variance the Self Storage portion is permissible the flex
space is not some of the other uses as of right in the HD1 zone are indoor Recreation health clubs and fitness centers adult daycare facilities Home Improvement centers Retail Services retail sales restaurants with drive-throughs hospitals health care so
again this is a permissive District the other thing that I would want to point out is that the two latest iterations of your master plan from 2019 and 2023 both talk extensively about creating Economic Development
opportunity and also developing vacant or underutilized properties so uh this is you know an undeveloped vacant site in the route 9 Corridor so certainly aligned with those principles in your most recent iterations of your master plan now what is it specifically and I
testified about this last month about this property that makes it uniquely or particularly suited doesn't have to be uniquely suited but particularly suited for this use and I think you know one of the things that I can't get away from as a planner is the geometry of this site
this site has about 200 feet of Frontage along Route 9 but then it runs back for over 1,600 ft so it is a very very long and thin skinny site which you know that's a difficult layout for a retail commercial shopping center so I think
that the use program that you have is really particularly suited for this proposed use and then some of the other things that you know we look at as planners is the stated purpose of the HD1 zone right the purpose of the HD1 zone is to provide for Highway oriented
development in the route 9 Corridor on larger Lots than permitted in the HC Zone this lot is certainly large enough to accommodate this use in in fact the HD1 Zone allows for an impervious coverage up to 70% the the impervious coverage on this site is only
27.4% so this is not a situation where this applicant is trying to shoehorn or cover you know every inch of a piece of property that could be developed some of the other things and I talked about this last month when I talked about the negative criteria were some of the things about this application that made
it a strong application that would have no substantial detriment right and that's the test again on the negative criteria the land law does not ask you to hold us to a standard that there be no detriments from the development whatsoever the test is that we have to balance it right in a way the positives and the negatives and here um one of the
things and we did you know you're at the time we were here last time we didn't really have a good handle on um our contributions right to the traffic signal I think you heard tonight that that would be 11% we also didn't have a a handle for you on what that would look like as far as the sore hookups and I
think we've answered that and those are certainly two public benefits that would be associated with this application but as far as the design of this site and some of the things that are associated with or would be with this particular approval if it were to move to site plan would be the doors oriented away from
the person doors oriented away from the residential uses the limited the no commercial access to Fort planes um and then the elimination of non-conforming uses right we know that we have several non-conforming residential uses on this site today that would be um eliminated
in conjunction um with this application the sit's in the HD1 Zone which does not allow for residential uses so these are the reasons when I talked about the positive criteria I talked about criteria G sufficient space and appropriate locations I talked about
criteria M and efficient use of the land and when I talked about the negative criteria I talked about all those benefits and some of the P the public benefits that are associated with this use on this piece of property so statutorily I think that this case is a home run I understand we are not where
we need to be on architecture and we will get there as we have done in how on many cases we have worked with your professionals to get there and the good thing about a bifurcated application right there's good and bad with everything you trade off a little bit on a bifurcated application you don't
improve the site plan but what that means is the applicant has to come back to you they still have to come back we to do this all over again they're noticed public hearings and you get another crack at this and so there is opportunity if we don't have every eye dotted and te cross as far as the site plan we're coming back before the board
for fullon hearings for preliminary and final site plan and I would imagine that if we were to be successful Mr Bear's um uh resolution would have something in there about you know the architecture was not resolved and that is being left to the site plan phase so on on on
balance and on point this is a vacant commercial property in the route n Corridor so I I appreciate that you know we are sensitive to things like our buffers and to traffic but I think when you when you break this application down and you look at the unique features of
this piece of property and you look at look at what the HD1 Zone was created to do I think that this is a really good marriage of getting this site to a productive use which is what the master plan calls for and develop it in in a in a context sensitive way so I I
unequivocally feel as though we meet our burden of proof our statutory burden of proof for the grants of all of this variance relief and I think that the plan before you um does a great job of taking advantage of the site site attributes and as far as um any other
bulk variance relief that was raised for signage it's my understanding that the applicant would intend to comply with the underlying sign plan for this site have sign ordinance I should say I have one question so the outset identified a number of
uses Ken you got to talk louder I I have one question for you at the set of your testimony you just stated you you read a number of permitted uses the self storage and the flex use if you from a
planning perspective if you could compare the intensity of those two uses to the types of uses that are expressly authorized and can you come to a conclusion that the the uses that are proposed are appropriate and are less intense from a planning perspective
absolutely they're much sleepier and that's the that was the whole intention of reading I should have probably made that more clear it wasn't just to read from the ordinance right the point of doing that was to say hey when the zoning was put in place here there were some pretty intensive uses read restaurants with drive-throughs
entertainment uses Home Improvement centers adult daycare facilities health clubs and fitness centers indoor Recreation those an indoor recreation facility uh is you know doesn't need to go on pass by traffic that would have a lot more in and out and and associated
with it so I do think that the HTH program before the board this evening is certainly arguably less intense than many of those as of rate uses in the HD1 Zone and I I do have a second question and I apologize for saying I only have
one the second question is this this property has substantial Frontage on Fort Plains Road this HD1 property has substantial Frontage on Fort Plains Road there is no prohibition of accessing Fort Plains Road in fact there's the one
were to read the ordinance the it's a permitted access point to the site so those more intense uses could be developed on the property and if someone not our clients did not have the foresight to go and purchase the right of way out through the KFC driveway and
they just took the developed this property consistent with the ordinance they would be permitted to send their traffic out onto Fort Plains Road yes and does that play into your analysis as to the this property being this application on this property being
appropriate and suitable yes and when I and I glossed over it because I did talk about this extensively um at the last time we were here so one of the things I said tonight in my in the betterments of this application was the no commercial access to Fort planes so I should have elaborated on that a little bit more but
when I say no commercial access to Fort planes I should have also said you know there's nothing precluding this applicant from having the right to access Fort planes for a commercial use we are a commercially zoned property and there is absolutely no restriction on running commercial traffic at to four planes and the applicant has offered
that to the township as a condition of any relief that this board grants that they would foro the use of Fort Plains Road for all purposes of access other than the single fire access requested by Chief
prno I have nothing further of Miss Kone and she is available to you and your professionals okay beam so well I agree with a lot of what was said there's a couple things that I think it's important for the board to
know we recently did a luse amendment to our master plan where we evaluated Flex space um not only did we provide a definition in the ordinance but we also identified the zones in which it would
be acceptable and those are HD3 hd4 SED basically so it was not that we haven't looked at it we did look at it very recently I think the master plan amendment was last
year the year before um there all the years are blending together maybe it's 22 as well um but it's not like we forgot about the use and you know now we're trying to determine where it's appropriate so basically we're looking
to put flex space in an area that's more industrial as you guys know hd4 HD3 is along 33 um primarily and the S zones are you know spread throughout the town but in areas that are in general
appropriate for Industrial Development and that's generally what I would consider Flex is an industrial type development and while I don't disagree that there are very intense uses that are allowed in the HD1 without tenants and I and I'm not suggesting
that this application is the only application that has come to us on spec cuz we hear it a lot however you could have a series of tenants that have fleet vehicles you could have landscape contractors that have a lot of equipment a lot of In-N-Out you could have trucks
so uh while I I'm not suggesting that this is going to be as intense as Home Depot let's just say but it could be more intense than some of the other uses that we see along Route 9 and as you know Route 9 is very heavily traveled
right it's like the spine that goes from Freehold down to ocean county and you know we have had our share of applications along that Corridor all of the time evaluating the potential impact for these types of uses
and vehicles Etc so I just wanted to put that on the record that you know Flex is not a new use introduced we we have evaluated it um secondly I am still a little concerned
about um the safety associated with what the board had discussed and I think Charlie had enumerated it very accurately that that retaining wall has the potential to force people to walk 150 feet along a building on fire before
they can safely get away now me I probably would jump over the wall but those that are you know Ada um individuals would not have the benefit of that opportunity so you know I'm not 100% sure what has been
presented and like I said we've gone through multiple iterations of the plans at this location and this is what were're been put forth this evening so based upon what I've seen this evening I do still have some concerns about the
safety associated with that proposal and design um and then the last thing I want to bring up is that while I think the intention to comply with the signage deals with the overall area of signage I think the application would still
require relief for the number of facade signs for especially the flex building we don't allow eight build eight signs per building that's not on a corner or you know I mean regardless so I do think there's still relief associated with
that so given those you know parameters it's up to you to decide whether or not you feel that the application you know meets the the prongs you have to decide is the site particularly suited do they Advance a
goal of zoning and are there no substantial detriments not just to the surrounding land uses but to the intent and purpose of the Zone plan and zoning ordinance and you know that whole Flex situation you know has a big question mark for me so you know you have to
decide whether or not you know the benefits outweigh the detriments very good Charlie the only comment that I'll add I I think uh Miss cfone said they're only proposing 27% in previous coverage of
the total lot area and I think it came up at prior hearings that there's a significant portion of the site that's restricted or um with environmental um regulatory challenges as far as Wetland stream cors and repairing um the portion that they're
subject to development you know it's actually significantly higher than that that they're proposing I think you heard you know Miss beam elaborate about the concern with the retaining wall and the fire erress from the building um I heard some questions from some board members about you know the retaining wall in
between the loading docks and you know um they're proposing retaining walls adjacent to some residential buffers if the scale of development were lower you know a lot of these things could probably be eliminated um but you know it's a lot of these things are also
being driven by the scale of the development so um just wanted to give that content thank you any board members have anything missone for planning okay thank you
y all right I guess now we'll uh open the public yes have a motion I make a motion to open to public everybody in favor I I the meeting will now be open to the public if you have something to say please come up and state your first and
your last name as well as your address thank you how are you sir Mr bear will swear you okay you swear that the testimony you give will be the truth the whole choose nothing but the truth I do state your name for the record spell your last
my name is James Gerard Jr g r a r d I live at 44 Arrowwood Court in owl in Tuscana um I've heard a lot tonight a lot has to do with the buildings themselves and traffic conditions and I
haven't heard anything whatsoever being discussed about the 186 units that are absolutely affected by this project um what I have here uh to present for
the public record and also for uh the board to consider is the concerns of the 47 5 to 500 people that live in tesana who live right on the other side of Ford blaes Road now I did hear I did hear
some good things Mr Gerard I don't mean to interrupt you but you didn't say do you have a position on the uh Homeowners Association of Tuscano yes you didn't say that you just gave your address oh I'm sorry I did not know I was asked to give that but okay well if you're going
to try to give a petition on behalf of other residents okay I am you have to explain that what your position is and how that came about okay well I'm a board member of the Tuscana Community uh we just had elections last month and I'm
one of the five board members I serve as secretary on the board okay is that good and then you said there's a petition or or signatures what is yes what what were people asked and was that given to the association
and to the homeowners association board if I may I as a member of the board I have no objection to Mr Gerard indicating what the board's position is with regard to the application but as this board is aware petitions cannot be
presented I cannot cross-examine a petition so since petitions are signed by people who are not in the room petitions are not permissible evidence um hold no no no no no you have to wait your turn
Mr bar do we yeah so why don't you give the position of the board at least and then as if why don't we start with that okay so the position of the community is that we have concerns regarding zoning and traffic and safety water flow and
flooding aesthetic impact noise and pollution property values Community integrity and lack of notification those that are being affected the most from a residential standpoint are the people in Tuscana who are right ask you what do you mean by
lack of notification I don't see anything that's come about to the people that are affected most directly to us required to notice within 200 feet of their property That's the Law that's it and there have been other towns that have asked applicants to notice beyond
that and the courts have shot it down and so when this application started their notice was found to be sufficient so they have noticed the relevant parties they go to go to the town they give their block and lot they get the property owners list within 200 ft and they send out certified mail they're not
required to notify everyone in your development so if we if you're not within 200 feet you're not getting a not you're not getting a certified notification in the mail that's that's the law okay well that's good to know because a lot of people in our community wouldn't know that I have a general
question that maybe do we know how much room is between where those of us that live on that side of Fort Plains Road the distance between where our homes are and where that back end of these
facilities are going to be including the parking lot and that wall that we've been talking about a lot so I think that Mr Mr Pape you probably should bring up Mr zugner to answer that question Mr zugner did testify to that at an earlier hearing but I I'm certain that he's
comfortable doing it again this evening you good sure so I think that you've got there's a number of ways of measuring there's the building there's the curb of the travel way there's the distance from uh our building to our property line and
then there's a distance to the homes on the other side if you want to take us through that to the best of your ability sure uh of course we have the microphone overl please thank you as we've talked about at length we have the buffer along Fort Plains Road but the distance from
our proposed property line to our building is 110 ft we've actually moved our property line in because we've dedicated or would dedicate additional RightWay so there's uh approximately
another uh 10 to 15 feet to the roadway I believe the roadway there is 30 feet wide of the cartway uh and then go to the other side of the RightWay and then you get to the home so in total again a little bit of an estimation here
but I would say uh you're probably close to 220 ft from from the homes okay and and just one other question and then I'll give up my time and that is that okay so I've heard that
that the entrance will be off Route 9 South and that you're not going to allow commercial traffic off onto Fort Plains Road correct however I did hear towards the end that I think the woman that was
up here just a moment ago said that there's nothing to prevent that from changing in the future which has a dramatic effect on Ford Blain's Road I I think I think the intention of the statement and I'm sure Mr Pape will correct me if I'm wrong is that there's
nothing to prevent an applicant from coming to this board or the planning board board with a development application and accessing Fort Plains Road from this property I think what they were saying is that they could have but this application has has no access
to Fort Plains Road so should the board act in the affirmative and I'm not opining that they will but if they do there will be no access from this development onto for planes if this development goes away and some new developer comes in there's nothing to
say that some future devel ER won't come out to for plan Z I think that was the intention of the statement I don't think it would means that they plan at some point in the future to do it it's they're not doing it I think it was more that's a benefit that they're putting forth to you that they're not going to
do that Mr Pap is that accurate yeah yeah that is an accurate statement and what the way that it's memorialized in in a restrictive covenant and a restrictive covenant is approved by the board approved by your attorney it's recorded at the county clerk's office and it has language it says it's in
perpetuity unless someone comes back to this board and asks for Relief so we're we're offering it as a permanent um situation so and just to clarify that too so there is an emergency a accessway that's proposed but that's going to be
like a grass paper surface and that was something that was worked out with the applicant and the fire buau so it's not a primary Ingress egress for normal operations it's in the event of emergency so fire truck can get in there I just wanted to clarify that that there is an access but it's only for emergency
purposes and and there'll be a gate there a locked gate at that access point KNX boox lock gate and it will look like grass it's not going to look like a driveway okay and the proposal for a traffic light at the corner over West Farms hits for Plains Road I understand
why that is under consideration because of the speed that's on coming up on West Farm's Road especially both so I get that but is that an independent thing from this yes so that's a Township thing what the applicant has agreed to do is
contribute to the value to put the light in they're only they're contributing 11% of the value what was it like 120,000 or 11% whichever is up to up to 120,000 Ken No No Cap 11% 11% 11% of what the actual
bid separate from they're contributing to it just like I don't know if you were at the meeting this several years ago for FP how which is at the intersection of Sunnyside and four planes they also agreed to contribute to the white so the township would be undertaking the light but these
applicants are contributing funds to to pay for it all right so this information I have here with 115 units that have signed off on it I can't present this for public or right so that so I know we
had a private discussion about this but the question is is when the you say the board that you're a part of formed an opinion is it just the five members of the board did you take it or did you learn the the uh this is going of the community this is going house to house
in our community and asking them how they felt about this particular project so I think that testimony gives the import of of or gives the uh flavor of what you did without running into the
evidentiary issue of the petion itself right you're giving the you just it it wasn't just five of you sitting in a room correct it was you you sought the opinion of the community and then the board sent you to testify right that is correct okay be mission accomplished on
his part yes okay okay so you're good to go okay no we don't we're good without that we're good with it all right that's not permissable right okay just just hold on to the you've testified to the facts I appreciate your time thank you
sir thank you anybody else please Mr how are you all right how you doing Mr bar will swear in yes sir you swear the testimony give will be the truth tell truth nothing but the truth I will state your name for the record spell your last James Fields fi L DS um
18 Rock spr Court right in Tuscana I am the President of the board I uh I want to thank Jim for coming up and helping us out and I'm going to speak on behalf of just being a resident and I just want you to I have to say please pardon my appearance I
came straight from the grelin uh basketball game fifth grade we did beat uh ramtown just so you know congratulations yeah thank you um we live in a great country we live in a a great state and I'll tell you what this is a awesome a awesome Township I
come from Red Bank that's where I was a police officer for all my career came over here to how and this is wonderful I will tell you I do understand being a board member um you know volunteering my time so I'm sorry that your wives and husbands are now waiting for you to come
home at 9:30 because I'm going to talk a little bit uh because it is going to affect my myself it's going to affect my friends it's going to affect my family it's going to affect my daughters most importantly um and you know I'm a business owner and I appreciate uh the
applicants for being uh part of this whole our Commerce you know we're in a beautiful in a in a great country where anyone can apply to do anything but I believe every application that is made has to be
considered and by you being uh volunteers of our of our boards and helping us and our neighbors we just ask you to think about the neighbors that this will affect um If This Were You if this was your family if this was your your daughters your mom maybe your your
sister and how this particular application would affect us more so than maybe as I I heard the young lady over there there are different uses that we can we can maybe approve for this land that could bring us great tax money can
bring us great quality of life certain things that would be beneficial to the surrounding town or the surround in area um as I start looking at at this space you know we we look at the the storage
um facility um Self Storage is we a lot of people need it right we have a bunch of them right there on route n so it's nothing new to the community or to the township uh but what are some of the adverse effects of a storage Community being a police officer for many years
and understanding and responding to these types of uh uh I guess uh commercial buildings there's different illegal activities there's people illegal boarding there's uh hazardous material being stored there's really no one to govern or watch the actions of
those who are going to self store that's why we call it self storage who is actually overlooking that person now when that fire happens we just saw a fire uh what about a year and a half ago with the winds and um person just was in
the back and a piece of Amber Ember went over the fence from Tuscana and the whole area right where you're talking about when I'm when a blaze it it's something that you truly have to think about then we move further
or closer to our property we see the flex uh buildings there and I when I think of flex I'm like well what what does flex mean anything right anyone can go there I heard uh someone
make a statement stating we we don't know who's going to be in the actual units themselves who's going to be there is it going to be a landscaper who's governing these people now I own a private business I'm a private security owner I'm over at Maza and a couple
other places and we have trucks that come down my security officers were placed there because the trucks would stand and just idle do you know that that w the 67 trucks we were talking about they emit over 90 DB while idling
now let me go put a tractor trailer right by your house stated 150 ft 100 feet let me put that right by your house and let 90 DB now let's think of what 90 DB is right now 65 DB coming from normal
conversation 80 to 85 DB come from from heavy traffic right Route 9 90 DB is at the is at the the sound of an actual lawn mower a lawn mower imagine at nighttime a lawn
mower coming in and and let's say it's 7 o' it's 8:00 it's time when you and your family are sitting down for dinner and you have your neighbor and we all have that one neighbor that wants to now come home from work and mow their lawn and at 8:00 right now people are going to sleep
my daughters go to sleep at 8 n 8 8:30 I sometimes I have to push them a little bit and uh you know they but they go to sleep early but now imagine 90 plus DB sitting idling it doesn't mean that's always going to be the case but it is I
hear Home Depot all the time and they're governed by a corporate entity that states all right you have to stop working at a certain time what about lose Landscaping no one's govering him and as he pulls his trailer around and he's making his noise and he's unloading his guys are in
this great country making a lot of money but they come in at 9:00 who's governing that who's are they going to have security to make sure that the sound and and the decb will be there we don't know is that something that we may have to
should you go to approve this which I hope you wouldn't because we are your neighbors we're your friends uh our children may know each other our children may play with each other I'm just ask you to consider us a
little bit it's our quality of life I live right there and let's say all of our property values have really benefited from the economy right now but do you think that I will be able to go
out and resell my property while in this great Market once this goes up I pay $188,000 in taxes I'm your neighbor I pay that much but yet I I feel as if I have no voice
and that's why I wanted to just come and share this with you we talk about traffic and how it's going to affect the people there and I I'll I'll say it's not just Tuscana that's going to be affected it's everyone in our area we just built a
beautiful um apartments that were right there on Fort Plains and West Farms brand new they just came there there's young lives that are starting off their life as young couples with their children hopefully going to become residents of
Hal and purchase their home they're going to be affected everyone down Fort Plains will be affected all the way to Burgerville you talk about The Jug Handle when you come up let's say you pull out of this this uh space that is proposed and you make your right and you're going south on rout 9 and let's
say they want to go back North I can already see I I see the accidents waiting to happen because when you make The Jug Handle and now you have to cross over you have to cross over three lanes and you only have about 200 feet so you're going from The Jug Handle
to then go one lane two lane to get to the left hand turn you're increasing that if anything that deserves a clover that deserves you to go across Route 9 and then behind and clover around the gas station because you're going to
you're going to require those people to say which I've done just today I had to stop even though I had space I didn't want to block this person that's coming off The Jug Handle because he did want to make a left and as a resident of how whether he was or she was or not I want
to say go ahead right so The Jug Handle is going to be an issue going behind Burgerville someone who's going to circumvent the system because they all will they're going to come cut through Home Depot or they might make the right right there on the on the West Farms then they're going to come back and they're going to turn on Fort PL just so
they don't have to do that because it's going to be a pain so they will increase that traffic right down um Fort Plains Road which will then affect every resident down there the trucks that we are talking
about the wwd 67 I just sat back there and I'll tell you what Chad gbt and and Google sck a great tool I'm I'm just listening and all the ideas and things that are coming up I'm thinking how much emissions can come from a truck within a
minute how much CO2 how much nitrogen and and all these all these fumes that are not going to go to your homes unless you live over there but they will come to mine they'll affect my children and that's the only thing that we're asking for again the application
for um Commerce of people who want to build businesses I I applaud them and I W I thank them for doing so right but there are better use case in this particular area than what is proposed right there are a great I I
could probably name a bunch of them off the top of my hand just looking at how Big Hal is I went to I went to Police Academy with kudri and I remember years ago I said dude you you working how what how how big he said this like 62 square
miles I said w oh that is a huge huge town I'm only in a 1.4 square mile in Red Bank right you guys got you guys are really rocking over there aren't you you know but this is a big Township and to place something this
huge so close to the residence when there are so many other places where this right here could go maybe we just ask you to reconsider maybe it's the the people people who have who own this property that wish to do it maybe they can go up
the street maybe they can go a couple miles away there are very very large pieces of property that can do so that they can they can facilitate this but I'm going to GNA get you guys home so you can go have dinner I know you're I
know you're ready to go but it's it's a couple of things that we just want you to realize we we are your neighbors we're your friends and we're your families and we want you to just think about before you you think of
maybe the the uh allowance of commercial space which will drive and we understand business it will give us taxes it will help us all as a community right but in turn you have to think about the quality of life that it's going to affect once
it's there because none of you police we can't be everywhere board members can't be everywhere councilman can't be everywhere our brand new mayor can't be everywhere but guess what's going to be there the people that work there that are going to be paying rent there they're going to be sitting there
they're going to come in at 9:00 they're going to come in at 10: they're going to come in on a Saturday at 2: that landscaper and I love that because I know landscapers they're going to Boom pull their engines and we're going to hear that all day long and when I look at it there's a bunch of tenants what if
there's 20 landscapers what if there are 20 different um businesses that have these big huge rigs we don't know what they're going to put there so I do just ask you to please think about us think about the the lives
that are there the humans that live there and just think maybe there's a better use case for this and we can then maybe even find them this particular group another space in our Township to bring us taxes and revenues and build
and and jobs I I see the benefit of something like this just not where it's at I thank you for your time thank you sir yes is there anyone else from the public and you'll swear in I wish I spoke before him Mr do you swear that
the testimony you give will be the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth yes Mark Cy two Castle Court spell your last name please p a r i s i I give a lot of credit to Mr fields that was um some powerful testimony I've been to a lot of these meetings as you guys know
it's not often that you see somebody a member of the public come up and really you know speak from the heart and is on point about a lot of stuff so S I give you a lot of credit yeah um a couple things that I want to talk about I know that you know this is a as M Kone talked about this is a bifurcated application
we're really I know you know oftentimes in these applications we get into some of the more technical stuff just because it's kind of woven into the the use stuff but I mean strictly it's my understanding that we're here really just to evaluate like you know the use side of it and you know just I I I kind
of want to stick keep my comment to that um I know that there's you know a drive to kind of develop underutilized properties in town it's a big town as we know uh you know we do want aables there's no question about that but I also know that having totally geeked out
and read you know the master plan and elements and re-exams and all that stuff that there's a lot of reference to talking about the encroachment of non-residential development on residential areas um that's replete throughout a lot of the different
documents that I've read and uh I understand that this particular lot is is unusual you know in its location that it's kind of an it's it's zoned for HD1 but it's pretty much all Frontage on on Fort Plains Road uh you know that's not lost on me I
would have liked to have seen them maybe Orient the buildings so that they're running more parallel to Route n and push further away from Fort ples so that there was more buffering there um but again this is their plan that they brought to you guys so you deal with the
plan that's before you um I don't think that it's a good idea to set a precedent allowing multiple principal uses on a lot I don't know why they're not subdividing it um I don't know why they're not there hasn't been any discussion about maybe trying to show some compassion towards the residents
that live on the Northern end a lot and subdivide that maybe work with the town to put an overlay and uh maybe try to SN some money into improving those Cottages getting some credits for the town and uh doing something good for the community since there's no intent to develop that portion of the property I I understand
there's some environmental constraints I don't know if that's a discussion that's been had it's not my business but it would be something that if this application moves forward that maybe there is some discussion uh to try to do something for those people up there um so I mean that's my feeling about it I I
I I agree with Mr fields that you know like this looks like a nice project you could have made those Flex buildings a little bit smaller you could have moved them a little bit kind of Northeast uh get get some more buffering on four planes road for the residents so that they don't have to you know see this Industrial Development that's on a
residential street because that is essentially four planes is a residential street in that area um I do give the the appli applicant credit for the fact that they've really tried to move uh and done a good job with moving all of the proposed traffic off of four planes and
onto Route N I think that's great I still think that there could there's still going to be impacts to the the community uh along four Plains Road uh that can't be mitigated except for them deciding that they're going to abandon one of the one of the uses and and
either do the self storage on the very south end of the property or just do the flex and try to move the flex buildings closer to Route 9 and away from uh Tuscana in in Fort Plains Road to create you know to fulfill one of the goals of the master plan which is to try
to prevent you know uh non-residential development don't fall over Mr Hughes um to prevent the uh you know the encroachment of uh you know non-residential development on in in residential areas and this is a residential area we all live in this
community we all know that this area I'm sure we've driven there at some point so I just hope that the board really considers that because you know once you approve a use variant it's it's Off to the Races I mean like yeah they're going to come back for site plan approval but now they have a used variant to develop
that property for you know for Industrial Development and let's be clear like you have residential development you have commercial development and you have Industrial Development there's a reason why our our our our Township officials you know allowed Flex warehousing along Route 9
South of lanes Mill Road if they wanted this type of development up in this area they would have included that as maybe a conditional use in the HD1 zone or they would have allowed it along the entire route n Corridor they didn't so I just ask that this board not Zone by variants
but try to stick to our zoning scheme so that we can try to prevent the encroachment of industrial devel development in residential areas thank [Applause] you is there anyone else okay seeing none motion to
close uh caner I don't know who's second oh all favor okay right Mr P do you have any final I would ask if I would have two minutes to speak to my clients if we could take
a brief recess sure thank you we'll take a five minutes the board will now take a five minute break and reconvene at 9:55 p.m. oh 9:55 we might just make it the meeting will now reconvene okay Mr
chairman members of the board the request of your applicant is that we be given one opportunity to do five minutes worth of addition additional testimony at a subsequent hearing the additional testimony will be confined to those safety issues that were addressed during
Miss beam's review of the architect and the engineer's design of the sidewalk I think that that is that's a vulnerable point I cannot leave it open I would ask if you could one witness five to 10 minutes tops but we do need some time to
do that and I would ask that we I be permitted to do my summation at the conclusion of that presentation and I look to you as to what's the first opportunity that that would work into your agenda this is we're at the the fourth meeting I mean what Jen what do you
think of I I mean it's totally up to you I texted to the applicant I mean I I [Music] don't I don't know that that I mean can
Mr Pape is entitled to present you know what he'd like to do but you know you're under no obligation to carry it yeah I mean this the fourth meeting and I know you guys have had a lot of uh correspondents there's an issue that
came up this evening that came up for the first time I can tell you we can address it promptly it's the only open issue that we have not addressed came up during the testimony of your professionals examining ours and I'm asking for the opportunity to put that on the record I mean Andy from a legal standpoint what do
we well well I think as Jen has pointed out you're not legally obligated to carry it I mean I can which I would think he could address it tonight with his professionals here but I mean the issu is becoming like our agenda is so backed up think the next
available dates like May June well I know we had talked about it you know if it does go past tonight that it could be worked on in uh site site plan if if it does move forward would what does everybody on the board think Mr caner you have any thoughts
I I'm based on all the testimony based on all the testimony that I've heard I'm prepared to vote Mr Ryan Mr B Mr Rosco do anybody have any thoughts on it well I know I brought up the point
about the fire egress and access and it it does have to be addressed whether it's down the road or yeah that's that's kind of what I was thinking I thought we kind of or with Mr Pap's recommendation to have somebody come and clear it up somewhere along the line it's got to get cleared
up I'm very concerned that it having it open as an issue the way that has been presented by your professionals to the board it leaves the applicant vulnerable it's a vulnerability that is not necessary I we can address it promptly
but I would ask that you give us you pick the date when was this last heard what was that Mandy does anybody feel that last heard in December yeah I have the dates right here was December 16th it was uh August
26th September 9th December 16th and tonight we're in there a couple times in between but there's no room for us yeah yeah anybody up here think that the the issues with that would be addressed in
you know addressed at site plan if it were to move forward or do does anybody want to have that resolved before you make a decision I know we do some stuff and later on when they do the uh site plan he said it's okay to for him to
address it it's okay with me to uh address it at site plan the issue that is the issue that the applicant has is very different here than the one that the board has I have a responsibility to make a record and I have a responsibility to making a record that's defendable and right now there's
a point that was raised that we have not addressed and I it's a point of vulnerability I don't want to leave it open as the attorney for the applicant I have a responsibility to make certain that the record is complete similar to not allowing a a a
petition Ken why can't one of your professionals figure out out how to address it now I mean honestly our agenda is so heavy and packed you have all your profession here address it now it's it's not something that can be addressed that
quickly we need to revisit the grading and revisit the way the way that the sidewalk system was designed and I think and I think both of those issues are very significant very um whether addressable or not they're very they're very significant to this
whole thing I agree but know we've done stuff in I mean this is the use variance versus you know the final site plan that's you know that's a my only concern nobody has any other thoughts I would like to vote tonight
it's be honest that's where I'm getting at but uh I don't if there's a vote this evening you and I respectfully I must put on the record it would be protested by the applicant that the applicant did not have the full opport to provide
important information even if the applicant gets a later date it's not going to take that much time it's just it's just this has been going on now for almost a year we've had I can't tell you how many trc's Charlie and I have had with this applicant like
at some point they have to own what they're presenting and be done with it like I think we've had two three trcs with them we've gone over issues ad nauseum so at some point like the hamster wheel
has to come to a stop and your applicant has on each and every one of those trc's and each and every time that we're here listen carefully and Incorporated revisions that are responsive I'm asking that you allow us to do that for the new issue that was brought to our attention
this evening we'll do it promptly we'll do it very quickly in our presentation but it's important information appreciate chairman your board members have said it you know I I know this has been going on forever and I know that we're we're reaching a point but I think
we do owe it to Mr Pape as he's been very respectful to us over the years to Grant him that opportunity um if you promise to keep it short the next time 10 minutes um because we we do not the Ala but but Mr Pape
specifically we do owe that him that courtesy I would agree agree we agree too that's very nice of you thank you okay so be it well that's another story yeah
that's um I have March 24th with your other application of Gateway that applicant will not allow me to put anything in front of them they went all it wouldn't go in front Ken it would go behind if it's short it doesn't need to go first you could go last that
should be the punishment for waiting honestly you got to sit here all night because he got those words yes the attorney is suggesting that I should be punished um I have May 12th with one
application on May 19th with no applications yet June 9th with one application on May 12 May 19th for the ones I just I'll take my client has asked that I take March 24th and we put it as the second item on the agenda I can assure
you you're probably not going to get reached so I'm just going to throw that out there and then the availability for your next meeting date is going to be that much farther out that application is as you know Ken gigantic so it's going to probably take the entire night that's the warehouse
over by Mulligan I don't know I feel like I'm losing something here why why this wouldn't be something we could deal with in the site plan I okay I I agree with you just give the C oh yeah yeah yeah no I believe me I'm not I'm not knocking Mr P I just want to
get this done it's kind of Mr chairman I don't understand um he going to come back for another date for 10 20 minutes and if it gets approved he's not going to continue he's coming back at another time and if it doesn't get approved then it will end there right yeah no I
understand I'm just think I just always thought you know we always had these things that were going to be dealt with in the site plan this is just the use variance part all it has to finish that in order to proceed or not proceed we have date well then do the May
date our client has asked that it be the 24th that to be placed after the Gateway I agree that it's a complicated application on Gateway I have a feeling that we're going to get a certain distance in the application and we're not going to get to the Finish Line um I
do think that it's realistic that there'll be an opportunity to be heard I I say if that's if that's what the applicant wants that's do it that's the request of the applicant Mr chairman if he comes in and does that we finish that one case and we
wrap it up at 10:00 finisher now and he's willing to proceed for another 15 20 minutes we just stay and do it [Applause] there's one suggestion Mr chair and and I don't know whether the the board is
inclined to do this and it's at your it's at your discretion but if the board chose to do a straw poll to discuss amongst itself its position on the application there might be an opportunity to move forward this evening
but that's that's your policy and your call Mr Bear yeah I don't I don't know about that what do you mean by a straw pole people's trying to get an idea trying to get an idea know he wants them to take a St pull on their disposition on the
application just suggesting it not asking it it's not uncommon in some boards it's unheard of the point so let's say there's a straw pole on the vote is no hypothetically then what then you carry
like I don't if it's yes then we go ahead is that it so I assume there's also going to be more test testimony put on then obviously open to public again and yeah yeah and uh but you're going to be the Public's going to only be allowed to examine that limited additional
safety testimony grading testimony okay we have a date 24th 24th uh yes March 24th March 24th right March 24th the applicant will present a single witness on the topic of safety and grading the walls and the
fencing and ask for the opportunity to summon conclude the heck am I looking I'm looking at the wrong thing here all right um will be doing it it's it's mostly his plan that needs
to be Revisited okay so everybody in the audience the uh case number ba20 118 Fort Plains Partners will be uh carried to March 24th uh do we need an
extension uh no the current extension expires March 30th oh okay then we're all good very good Mr chairman board members all thank you good night thank you good
night starting to get further business motion to close I I okay