Category: MAC zoning

 

My wife attended the meeting on 380 Maple West/Sunrise Assisted Living two nights ago, in the Vienna Community center.    This is a brief and second-hand summary. Continue reading Post #439: Community meeting on 380 Maple West/Sunrise Assisted Living

The Town of Vienna Transportation Safety Commission frequently gets requests from citizens to have the town install a red light camera or speed camera at some problematic location in Vienna.  These cameras would then be used to catch red-light runners and speeders, and presumably reduce both speeding and red-light-running.

At the 10/29/2019 meeting of the Transportation Safety Commission (TSC), a representative from the Town of Vienna police department summarized Virginia law regarding speed cameras and red light cameras.  And the short answer is no, the Town isn’t going to install speed cameras or red light cameras, for some very good reasons. 
Continue reading Post #438: Red-light cameras, speed cameras

This post is mostly for benefit of the people in my immediate neighborhood.  This is about the study that Town Council called for, of the neighborhood bounded by Courthouse, Nutley, and Maple.

I went to the Transportation Safety Commission meeting last night with one goal in mind.  I wanted a clear answer to what I thought was a fairly simple question.  Boiling it down, in the context of the Town’s decision to allow high-density housing along Maple via MAC zoning, my question had two key parts

Will the Town of Vienna act prospectively, to preserve a low-traffic neighborhood, and defend it against the traffic increases brought on by MAC development?

On the first part — prospectively — I got a clear answer.  The “prospective” part of this study is that the Town will take existing traffic counts, and add the projected traffic increases from approved MAC projects to them.  So for this study, the Town will not use existing traffic, they’ll construct a projection of traffic by tacking on the developers’ estimates of traffic to be generated by their new buildings.

Putting aside the quality of those projections (e.g., Post 364), all this means is that the Town will repeat the same calculations that the developers of 444 and 380 Maple did.  The sole difference is that they’ll refresh the traffic counts.

On the issue of acting to preserve a low-traffic neighborhood, the answer was not at all clear.  So, major caveat: What you will read next is my reading of the tea leaves, based on what was said.What I got, when I pushed the question, is that they weren’t going to consider that at this point.  But my impression, when the dust had settled, is the following:

My best guess is that no, the Town will not act to preserve a low-traffic neighborhood.  I’m guessing — actually, I’m fairly confident — that the next step in the Town’s study will be to compare the projected traffic in each neighborhood with the existing standard that the Town uses to determine whether “traffic calming” measures may be warranted.  I.e., the threshold used to determine whether or not to put a speed hump on a residential street.

In other words, literally the only difference between this study (of our currently low-traffic neighborhood) and the Town’s standard analysis for traffic calming will be that the Town will add in projected traffic from the approved MAC buildings, based on the developers’ projections.

To summarize where I stand on this:  My wife and I bought our house in large part because it was in a quiet neighborhood adjacent to Maple.  The Town then changed the zoning to encourage the construction of high-density housing (“mixed use”) along Maple.  The result — so far — is approval of two large new buildings whose users will almost certainly view my street as a convenient cut-through.    We were hoping that the Town would act to try to preserve the quiet character of the neighborhood.  We were hoping the Town would act to offset some of the negative impact its rezoning decisions would have on my neighborhood.  We were hoping it would do what it could to prevent my street from turning into yet another of those Vienna streets whose residential character is marred by high traffic.

In short, we were hoping the Town would act to clean up the mess this is going to make of my neighborhood.  And, as I read the tea leaves at this point, the answer is no, they won’t do that.  We have to wait until traffic trashes our neighborhood, to the same extent as it trashes the rest of Vienna, before the Town will feel any obligation to do anything to reduce the impact of the changes that it caused by rezoning Maple.  So, if I have interpreted this correctly, only when we get to the point that we’d qualify for (e.g.) a speed hump, under the standard rules, will the Town consider taking action.   As I read it, projected traffic on our street will have to exceed the standard threshold of traffic misery before the Town will do anything.

So — again, assuming I have interpreted this right — the Town simply isn’t in the business of preserving quiet neighborhoods.  That’s not on the agenda.  It isn’t in the business of trying to maintain quality of life, as far as traffic goes.  Not even when it’s the Town’s decision (to rezone Maple) that’s degrading quality of life in a neighborhood.

Finally, we got a clear indication of how little the Town is not willing to do.  Department of Public Works stated, unambiguously, that they will never recommend any type of no-entry or no-turn-during-rush-hour signs.  The (sole?) rationale is that such signs merely divert traffic to other streets.  Town Council may always override that decision if it chooses to do so.

(I’ll explain why this no-sign policy matters critically in this case.  The Tequila Grande/444 Maple West project is going to result in maybe 250 adults living at the corner of Maple and Nutley.  Who knows how many will be added when and if the rest of that block redevelops under MAC.  The path of least resistance, connecting them to southbound Nutley in the AM rush hour, is probably going to be my little street.  But a cheap and simple no-right-turn-during-rush-hour sign at Maple and Wade Hampton would prevent that.  Another one at Pleasant would do the same there.  But if neither one is an option, we’re going to have to ask for much more radical changes than just putting up a sign.)

And, weirdly, that’s completely consistent with the rest of it.  The message is that we all have to be equally miserable from traffic.  Even if it’s the Town’s rezoning decision that creates the traffic in your neighborhood.  The Town simply has no interest in keeping a peaceful neighborhood peaceful, regardless.

Well, at least it’s good to know the rules.  The clear takeaway from this is that if you are planning to move to Vienna, don’t buy a house near Maple.  And by all means, buy on a cul-de-sac.  Because anything else puts you at risk for being in a high-traffic neighborhood.  And if your neighborhood is as unlucky as mine has been, the Town won’t act until your neighborhood hits the required level of traffic misery.  That’s my best guess for how this will all shake out.

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Codas and minor technical notes.

First, I guess that some will read this posting and consider it nothing more than pleading for special treatment.  But I look at it more as a question of cleaning up your own mess.  It’s not as if this additional traffic came out of nowhere.  It’s a result of the Town’s actions.  The Town’s decision to rezone Maple is going to add a mess of traffic to my street.  And because we have a pleasant neighborhood now — relatively low traffic — the Town will likely do nothing to clean up that mess. Or, more to the point, do nothing to keep that mess off my street.

Second, as envisioned, this is a one-off study.  It does nothing new, and it does nothing to modify the MAC rezoning process.  There isn’t going to be any standard set of “neighborhood protection” measures to be added to MAC.  And I think that makes sense, because there’s no intent to protect the Maple-adjacent neighborhoods.  The fact that the additional traffic is cause by the Town itself — by its decision to rezone — makes no difference.

Finally, maybe my neighborhood was the last quiet neighborhood adjacent to Maple.  So maybe the Town just plain doesn’t have to worry about trashing any more neighborhoods with MAC development, because the rest of the streets connecting to Maple either don’t go anywhere, or are already trashed by traffic?

My guess is, no, that’s not right.  Because no matter how bad traffic gets, it can always get worse.  So I suspect that this problem isn’t going away.  Neighborhoods that are going to bear the brunt of the additional traffic generated by these MAC projects are going to continue to raise objections.

But at least when this study is finished, we’ll all know what the rules are.  My best guess, at this point, is that the only accommodation the Town will offer will be to add projected traffic from a new MAC building to their standard process for determining whether a street qualifies for traffic calming.  And so the clear messages are 1) MAC projects are going to dump more traffic into your neighborhood and 2) tough luck.  Until you’re as miserable as the rest of Vienna, it’s not the Town’s problem.  The Town will not, in fact, try to clean up its own mess.

That’s how I see it.

See my just prior post.  I had not planned to talk, but here’s what I’m going to say, asking for TSC to clarify some fairly basic points about this proposed study of my neighborhood.

Continue reading Post #435: My comments asking for a clarification from TSC tonight

Some topics to be discussed this week include:

• Rewriting all Town of Vienna zoning ordinances.
• Increasing allowable lot coverage in residential areas in exchange for stormwater management.
• Rental electric scooter pilot program.
• Red light cameras and speed cameras in Vienna.
• Possible sale of 380 Maple West building rights to Sunrise Assisted Living.
• Extending the MAC moratorium to June 30, 2020.

For Town meetings and work sessions, audio recordings will be available the “archives” section of this web page:  https://www.viennava.gov/index.aspx?NID=567

In addition, for Town Council and Planning Commission meetings, the Town broadcasts meetings, the Town broadcasts those live on Cox channel 27, Verizon FIOS channel 38, and streaming at http://vienna-va.granicus.com/player/camera/3?publish_id=5

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Monday, 10/28/2019, at 7:30 PM in Town Hall, Town Council will hold a work session to discuss, among other things, the scope of a proposed (roughly) quarter-million-dollar contract for a consultant to help update the Town’s zoning ordinances.  Separately, they will discuss a proposal to allow 30% lot coverage in residential areas (up from the current 25%) if homeowners implement a stormwater management system.  

The relevant materials can be found here:

https://vienna-va.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=718283&GUID=A00DD1B9-01A1-45EE-9437-BE5A6B2DE849&Options=info&Search=

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Tuesday, 10/29/2019, at 8:00 PM in Town Hall, the Transportation Safety Commission will meet to discuss, among other things, a pilot program for rental electric scooters (and other “shared mobility devices”) in the Town of Vienna.  Separately, they will discuss red-light and speed cameras in Vienna. 

Prior to this, starting at 7 PM, the Bicycle and Pedestrian Safety advisory committees will meet, but no agenda is yet available for that meeting.

The .pdf agenda for the meeting (no materials are provided) can be found here:
https://www.viennava.gov/Archive.aspx?ADID=4387

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Tuesday, 10/29/2019, at 7:30 PM in the Community Center, there will be a meeting to introduce (probably) Sunrise Assisted Living as the (possible) new owner of the 380 Maple Avenue (Maple and Wade Hampton) MAC development.

As far as I know, there has been no official public announcement of this by the Town of Vienna.  I believe that some individuals received an email.  Citizens are welcome to hear Sunrise’s plans and to ask questions or offer concerns.

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Wednesday, 10/30/2019, at 8:00 PM in Town Hall, the Planning Commission will hold a public hearing on extending the MAC moratorium to June 30, 2020.  (The extension should not be controversial, but this public hearing is a legal requirement.)  Prior to this, starting at 7:00 PM, they will hold a work session for discussions with the Town Attorney.

This is a public hearing, so I believe citizens may speak for up to three minutes.

Public hearing materials are here:
https://vienna-va.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=673421&GUID=7151C270-9A02-4776-8671-ED1C81520C81&Options=info&Search=
Prior work session notice is here (read the .pdf agenda to see the content of the meeting).
https://vienna-va.legistar.com/DepartmentDetail.aspx?ID=35871&GUID=5F43A6E1-E522-486D-A271-B83ED29861B9

 

In the diagram of the front of the Chick-fil-A-car-wash above, with Maple Avenue at the top, the drive-through window for the Chick-fil-A exits at the right side of the building (nearest Nutley), where the blue rectangle is.

In the original design, drive-through users would have then driven down the front of the building to return to the access road that runs past McDonalds.   I.e., they would have taken a left, using the brick “plaza” as an extension of the drive-through-lane.  Functionally, that brick “plaza” was just a driveway connecting the drive-through exit to the access road.

The Town changed that, requiring that the drive-through lane exit right-turn-only, directly onto Maple.  In theory, then, you can’t get back to the access road, if you go through the Chick-fil-A drive-through.

I have now seen several people comment on how fundamentally goofy this traffic flow is.  Upon inspection, it’s unlike any other fast-food drive through that I’ve ever seen.  It’s practically designed to result in a traffic jam.

Let me walk you through it, and give you my best guess as to what’s actually going to happen. To cut to the chase, my guess is, people are going to drive across the brick plaza anyway.   It’s set up to allow it (physically), and it will be vastly easier.  And as a result, that brick “gathering space” will be nothing of the sort.  It’ll just be the exit of the drive-through lane.  Exactly as was envisioned in the original plans. Continue reading Post #431: Is the Chick-fil-A “gathering space” a sham?

Consider two small restaurants that are completely identical, except that one is fully enclosed, and one is open to the outdoors.  One has 10 tables, located in a little storefront along Maple Avenue.  The other has 10 tables under an awning, adjacent to the Maple Avenue sidewalk.  They serve identical menus, charge identical prices, and do an identical amount of business.  And for either one, you can’t use the tables unless you buy something to eat.

Separately, one restaurant is part of a building that sits on a 2.99 acre parcel of land.  The other restaurant is part of a building that sits on a 3.00 acre parcel of land.

Clear?  Nearly identical restaurants on nearly identical parcels of land.

And now, two questions, with answers provided below.

Question 1:  Which of the following statements is true, regarding proposed Maple Avenue zoning:

A:  The Town offers a bonus for the indoor restaurant seating.

B:  The Town offers a bonus for the outdoor restaurant seating.

C:  The Town is neutral about the choice of indoor or outdoor seating.

Question 2:  Which is true, regarding the two parcels of land that these restaurants sit on, under the proposed MAC zoning revisions. 

A:  The Town requires twice as much open space on the 2.99 acre parcel.

B:  The Town requires twice as much open space on the 3.00 acre parcel.

A:  The Town treats the two parcels more-or-less the same.

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To the best of my understanding, the correct answers are B and B.

For question 1:  Builders have to reserve some minimum amount of “gathering space” on property redeveloped under MAC zoning.  The new “gathering space” requirement replaces the existing “open space” requirement.  If they don’t provide enough “gathering space”, they can’t redevelop the lot under MAC.

The 10 outdoor restaurant tables, accessible from the sidewalk, appear to count as “gathering space”, while the indoor tables definitely do not.  That makes the 10 outdoor tables much more valuable to the builder.  The indoor tables are simply commercial space.  The outdoor tables are not only commercial space, but in addition help satisfy the “gathering space” requirement.

For question 2:  The proposed law literally has a sharp cutoff at exactly 3 acres.    The Town doubles the “gathering space” requirement if the lot is 3 acres or more.  The 2.99 acre lot is required to reserve 10% of the (buildable area of the) lot as “gathering space”.  The 3.00 acre lot is required to reserve 20% of the lot as “gathering space”.

Aside:  The proposed law is actually substantially worse than that.  Not only does it require 10% more “gathering space”, but developers can sidestep that if they provide “cottage housing”.  Any cottage housing, as the draft currently reads.

Commentary:    The “open space” requirement was arguably the single most screwed-up part of the MAC statute.  You can read an old writeup of it here.

Here’s the problem:  It’s not getting any better.   It’s different under the proposed MAC.  It’s now “gathering space” instead of “open space”.  But in terms of double-counting spaces, allowing little dribs and drabs of space to count, and so on, it’s more-or-less no better than it was.  One truly goofy part of the prior law was eliminated, in that courtyards that are completely internal to a building, and only accessible to building residents, will not count as “gathering space” (but did count as “open space”).  But otherwise, pretty much all the things that made the prior requirement worthless still remain.

And now we are weaponizing it with some fairly significant financial incentives.  Build a restaurant with three sides, that counts.  Add that fourth wall, so that the same space can be used in winter, and it doesn’t count.  Cross that 3.0 acre line, and you are slapped with a big penalty.  But build some cottage housing, and you dodge the penalty.

And so, as the Town now changes this requirement, and uses it to create new and untested financial incentives, I think maybe it needs to step back and ask “what, exactly, are we likely to get with this “gathering space” requirement?”.

First, to be clear, you aren’t getting public parks.  This “gathering space” is private property.  It’s not a park, in the sense of Town-owned land open to the public.  It might be a space where you could (e.g.) stroll up and sit on a bench.  It might be a space where you’d feel like you were intruding on private property if you did that.  And it might be a strictly pay-for-play space, such as an outdoor restaurant.   And it might be nothing more than a broad sidewalk.

Second, we should have enough sense to do a little arithmetic, to get some idea of what we’d be getting under the proposed law.  Are we getting anything more than a broad sidewalk as mandatory “gathering space”?

In some cases, the answer is easily shown to be no.  For example, if the Wawa parcel were redeveloped under MAC, the existing, legally-required setbacks from the roadways would far more than satisfy the “gathering space” requirement.

The Town is proposing to have a 28′ setback from the Maple Avenue curb, and a 20′ setback from any other major street.  That’s already required.  In both cases, maybe 12′ of that will be literally in the Town’s right-of-way, and so is not private property that counts as “gathering space”.  The new Wawa sits on a lot that’s about 37,000 square feet.  If that were redeveloped under Maple, something under 3700 square feet would have to be gathering space.  (Under, because only the “buildable area” counts, that is, area of the lot excluding the mandatory setbacks and such.)  The portion of the Maple Avenue setback that is private property is about (170′ long x 16′ deep =) 2720 square feet.  The portion of the Nutley Street setback that is private property is (330′ long x 8′ deep =) 2640 square feet.  Together, that’s 5360 square feet.  The setbacks alone vastly exceed the required amount of “gathering space”.

Is this what the Town meant when it asked for “parks and plazas” along Maple, as part of MAC zoning?  A broader sidewalk?  How did we get from that simple desire, to this outcome?

I attended last night’s Town Council work session on revising the commercial zoning codes along Maple.  You may download my audio recording at this Google Drive link, and my Excel workbook “index” file (as to what was said, when) at this Google Drive link.  The Town will probably post its own (and much better) audio recording in the “archives” section of this Town web page.  They started their recording at a different time from when I started mine, so the times in my “index” file will be close to, but not exactly right, for the Town’s recording.

I’m going to think about this another day before I post any analysis of what went on.  I’m just going to offer a broad outline here.

Town Council members were given a list of six broad topic areas that need to be addressed for any rewrite of MAC.  That was given to them, on a white board, by Town staff, and was in theory a summary of the seven lists that Town Council members had provided (available here).  That list of six broad topic areas is equivalent to the first column in my summary of Town Council’s comments, found in Post #427.  I had a slightly different list, and I annotated who said what.

After a lot of discussion, it turned out that the core task for the evening was to come up with questions to be used in surveying Vienna citizens to see what they want on Maple Avenue.  But, at the end of the more than 2.5 hour meeting, that task of drafting survey questions was turned over to the Department of Planning and Zoning.  Which, as I have said as emphatically as I can say, is, in my opinion, a classic blunder (Post #415).  That’s also what prompted my just-prior post.

In the course of that, Councilman Potter repeatedly pointed out that we already have considerable information about what people want, from various prior surveys.  It’s mostly a question of using it.   And there seemed to be general agreement on Town Council that the Town Council itself did not want any more buildings like 444 Maple West.   But the idea here appears to be to survey Town of Vienna citizens on the fine details of things like allowable building heights.

I found that Councilwoman Colbert made the single most cogent point of the entire evening.  And was … not quite ignored, really, but nobody quite knew what to do about it.  Her point is that you need to show people realistic choices, in the sense that you can’t promise small buildings and lots of benefits for the Town.  There simply would not be the economic surplus/profit from small buildings to allow the Town to ask for much in the way of proffers from builders.  Her point is that you need to know what’s economically feasible, as a whole, before having a survey.  She suggested getting some builders to provide cost estimates of what would and wouldn’t be profitable on Maple.

But beyond that lack of any idea whatsoever of the underlying economics of what the Town is doing, asking separate survey questions on different aspects of MAC completely guts the point she was trying to make.  If you want to see why, look at the two two questions on burying the power lines in my brief parody survey, Post #428.  As it turns out, the Town had already asked about burying the power lines, in its own survey, and found that Town residents overwhelmingly favored burying the power lines.  Something line 91% agreed that would be a good thing to do.  But the question they asked was like my first power line question.  In effect, if it were costless to bury the power lines, would you do that?  Unsurprisingly, many said yes.  The Town did not ask my second, far more economically realistic question, which included the cost of doing so.

But the Town has a long-standing history of asking mom-and-apple pie questions, when soliciting citizen opinion about Maple Avenue.  And the answers to those questions, asked that way, are more or less meaningless.  And damned if it doesn’t look like the Town is going to do that yet again.

Separately, just for the record, Councilman Noble again came out strongly in favor of a random-sample survey.  I could not possibly agree with him more on this point.  In fact, he asked for a stratified random sample — one that attempted to get a survey sample that was a match for the demographic mis of the Town’s residents.  (And, I infer, would have used the response rate from the Town’s prior survey, by age category, to set up different sampling rates by age, so as to get responses that reflected the actual cross-section of Vienna residents.)  I’m just making the point that one Town Council member was absolutely clear that this should be a requirement for the survey.  What I did not hear was any general agreement, and in particular, I did not hear the Mayor second that idea.  So we’ll see what the Town actually gets.

I only have one more thing to note here, which is that Maple Avenue traffic was a major topic in my summary of Town Council comments.  But that somehow didn’t make the cut when Town Staff put together a list.  And the first (and only) brief mention of traffic, in the entire 2.5 hour meeting, occurred at 2:15.  (That’s the image at the top of the page — that’s a snapshot of my Excel “index” file for the meeting.)  It was mentioned, once, incidental to a discussion about parking.  Make of that what you will.

Oh, and the third map was still missing.  And yet, still very much talked about, in some form or another, by both Councilman Noble and Councilman Majdi.  If I have to draw it, it has no standing.  Town staff have to draw that third map, the one that shows the potential downtown “core” area.  Coucilman Noble described it (Lawyer’s to Park, Maple and Church), but there needs to be a picture and it needs to be given some official status.

 

Note:  This is not an actual survey.  I’m not collecting answers to these questions.

Question 1:

 

Above you see the Chick-fil-A-car-wash.  It’s a reasonable proxy for what MAC zoning will bring to Vienna.  The building itself stands 43′ tall; the tallest tower is 62′ tall.

The front of the building sits 24′ to 30′ off Maple Avenue.  That “setback” provides a private-property gathering space where Vienna citizens can socialize, as long as they buy something from the Chick-fil-A.

The Town of Vienna is considering allowing developers to place buildings like this all along Maple.  Most will have housing on the upper floors instead of a car wash, typically condos or apartments.

Citizens of Vienna will get a series of these private-property gathering spaces adjacent to Maple Avenue, similar to the front of the Chick-fil-a-car-wash, along with new mixed-use (retail and housing) buildings.

The initial wave of construction (approximately a dozen new buildings) will result in a one-third increase in the number of cars on Maple Avenue during rush hour.

Question:  Should the Town of Vienna proceed with this plan?

Yes

No

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Question 2:

Would you like to see the above-ground power lines along Maple removed (i.e., buried underground)?

Yes

No

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Question 3:

The Town of Vienna is considering whether or not to remove the above-ground power lines along Maple.  This will cost the Town approximately $20 million.  Only the lines running along Maple will be removed, not the power lines that cross over Maple (as illustrated above).  Power lines will not be removed on any of the other streets in Vienna.

Should the Town proceed with its plan to remove (i.e., bury) the above-ground power lines along Maple?

Yes, please spend $20 million to remove some of the power lines on Maple.

No, please find a better use for that money or don’t spent it at all.

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Question 4:

The Town of Vienna is going to survey its citizens regarding MAC zoning.  Should the Town use actual pictures of actual MAC buildings, or should they use pretty pictures of far nicer streets, as shown above.  That is, should the Town use pictures of streetscapes that are far nicer than Maple Avenue could possibly be,  in order to gather opinions about what to do with Maple Avenue?

Choose one:

Show me reality (actual Maple Avenue)

Show me fantasy (locations that are much nicer and more spacious than Maple Avenue)

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Question 5:  Bonus question.

If you laid $20 million worth of $100 bills end to end, in a straight line, starting at Maple and Center, how far could you get?

Gainesville, VA

Germantown, MD

Dale City, VA

Andrews AFB, MD

Any of the above