A tale of two projects? Brightleaf Commons, Ninth Street North get hearing before Planning Commission

The Brightleaf Commons shopping center proposed for US 70 near the Brightleaf at the Park subdivision in eastern Durham County and the Ninth Street North project both made it before a fairly well-attended Durham Planning Commission meeting on Tuesday night.

It was an ironic pairing -- the latter a dense development aimed at a transit-oriented tomorrow that's not here today; the former, a vehicle-oriented shopping center more familiar to cities like Durham.

One of the projects is your typical suburban shopping center out on the edge of a large development of single-family homes, filled with neighbors who've lived there a couple of years at best. The other project is one of the largest, densest proposals that has ever come to Durham's compact neighborhood tier, bordered by two of Durham's most powerful, organized neighborhoods.

One of these hearings was almost pro forma, almost a rubber stamp. The other was a raucous two hour drubbing, with exclamations from the audience to such an extent that one of the Planning Commission members asked all parties to remain professional.

Ninth Street North: If you thought that Ninth Street North -- a project that's drawn intensive scrutiny from Old West Durham and Watts-Hillandale neighbors -- was the one getting the raspberries, you guessed wrong.

NSN made it through on a unanimous 13-0 vote recommending the site's rezoning to mixed-use with a development plan, with OWD's John Schelp and W-H's Tom Miller both giving the project an endorsement on behalf of their respective associations. No opponents signed up to complain about the multi-story project set to contain over one hundred multi-family housing units.

Describing the past month's discussion since the Planning Commission delayed a December vote as allowing "tremendous amount of progress -- healthy progress," Stanziale praised what he called a "great consensus."

"It is a project that is goign to help define this area of Durham and it is a project we should have in an area that is going to be a transit station area," Stanziale said.

"We've been working on this for quite a long time," said Miller, "and I'm pleased to stand before you tonight on behalf of my neighborhood association and say we support this project."

The nature of the residential units got some attention in light of the negotiated requirement that these be set up legally as condominiums from day one, though as Stanziale noted, this arrangement was negotiated by neighborhoods for the Station Nine and Lakeview developments as well.

Miller reminded the board that the units remain the property of the developer, Glenn Dickson, to do with as they wish. "It doesn't require him to sell them. It doesn't require him to rent them," he said, noting this simply impacted the initial organization of the property.

Planning Commission members posited a few changes they'd have liked to see, ranging from bike accomodation to sidewalk extension, but Stanziale didn't budge on committed elements, in what appeared to be a logical push-back to the board: we made the neighborhoods happy, the look on his face said without speaking -- what more do you want changed?

Longtime Durham pol and Planning Commission fixture Jackie Brown made a pointed comment aimed at the City Council's hemming-and-hawing on whether to remove the ability of the Planning Commission to delay hearings on projects, often in an attempt to compel more community conversations -- a move that's the only power the Planning Commission really has, since its recommendations to local governments are non-binding.

"You guys have worked long and hard to get where you are tonight," Brown said. "This is absolutely a product of what that [Planning Commission delays] does to help in some instances."

Brightleaf Commons: The hearing on Brightleaf Commons, by contrast, was a two-hour battle of comments and rebuttals far more contentious than the amicable, fast consensus on Ninth Street North.

The development in question is a shopping center planned for 70-plus acres off of US 70 on the front side of Brightleaf at the Park, the 1,200 single-family home subdivision that's about one-sixth done between 70 and Sherron Rd. The main entrance to the site comes via Copper Leaf Parkway, a bucolicly  winding road that brings a sense of the forest as you drive into the neighborhood.

Yet the winding nature of that road is not a neighborhood amenity -- it's just an access portal through a commercial development not yet built.

Despite the similar names, Brightleaf at the Park and Brightleaf Commons are separate projects with separate developers. The former arranged for access through the latter's property for the subdivision, while the Brightleaf Commons team long-planned commercial and retail development along that winding road -- something that some residents didn't seem to be aware of based on last night's meeting.

Take the case of Larry Heathcote: the IBMer and his wife signed a contract with a homebuilder in the neighborhood and closed on their home a year ago. 

"We were told throughout the entire construction and building process that Copper Leaf Parkway was residential, would always remain residential, and was protected," Heathcote said.

Yet consultant Ron Horvath, speaking on behalf of the applicant, noted in his rebuttal that the winding nature of Copper Leaf Parkway was designed from day one to maximize future commercial development opportunities (by creating more frontage for future development presumably) -- not a tree-lined curved path for its own aesthetic sake.

"Given the amount of property out there [the access road] could have been a straight shot through to 70," Horvath said. "And the Brightleaf at the Park developer knew that."

Representatives from the unrelated residential development team did not appear to be present at Tuesday night's meeting.

Based on comments from many of the forty or so residents at last night's meeting, other homebuyers seemed to have their own visions of what would have been built there. Some favored a center that would consist, in the words of one woman, of a "small, swanky boutique mall" along US 70.

"Then, just recently, we got our hands on this, and we did not know it would encroach right behind Hemlock Hill [Drive], right behind our homes," said one resident.

"We thought we were going to get a Harris Teeter," said another.

Whatever grocery or other stores take root would, as proposed, be one part of a larger proposed development -- all told, a 430,000 sq. ft.-plus shopping center. (By comparison, the Woodcroft Shopping Center is approximately 190,000 sq. ft., according to one person in attendance at the Planning Commission meeting.) Included in that number is a proposed large home improvement store at the middle of the development.

Residents from the neighborhood raised other concerns, ranging from the addition of more cars driving away animals and making it dangerous for their children to bike to school, to the fear that the connection of the center to Brightleaf's trail network would bring undesirables into the neighborhood, to the impact of lighting and loading docks on the rear side of the shopping center backing up to houses.

The applicants brought a number of traffic improvements to the table compared to their previous application -- the rezoning was originally proposed in 2005 -- and would add two new traffic lights along US 70 to allow turn-in/turn-out traffic.

Yet commissioners for their part were drawn to the finding that so-called "net external daily trips" added from the center would bring US 70 to 109.9% of its required level of service, precisely 0.1% below the (artificial) threshold development requirement, a margin that sent planning staff to answer questions on rounding.

The calculation excluded shopping trips originating on the roads within the subdivision -- keeping in the spirit of one of the applicants' arguments, namely that co-locating a large commercial development and shopping near a large neighborhood helped to cut down the number of car trips required.

The argument seemed to resonate with Planning Commissioner Corrine Mabry, who commented on this point before her vote in favor. Joined only by I. Jarvis Martin in the affirmative, however, the measure failed 10-2.

Although commissioner and one-time county commission candidate Don Moffitt expressed "very mixed feelings" on the proposal before opposing it (noting he was "very dismayed at the amount of single-family residential being developed out in the eastern part of the county" and that, given that construction, highways like US 70 were the right place for large retail build-out), that reflected the extent of the support audible from planning commissioners for the project as proposed.

Neighborhood members' comments came on the heels of a Dec. 4 presentation by the development team to residents, a timing too close to the originally scheduled Dec. 9 docket slot for the project (later delayed until January) for the comfort of some commissioners. Commissioners also had questions about a property owner whose land is enmeshed in the midst of some of the proposed rezoned property.

Eastern Durham County advocate Tina Motley-Pearson also made a presentation to the commission, raising concerns about runoff of nitrogen and other algae-forming chemicals into Falls Lake, and arguing that local government needs to be more aggressive in avoiding intensive development near Lick Creek and other Falls Lake streams.

The development team proferred additional restrictions on the build-out over the course of the evening, including a restriction on the nature of uses for the office spaces closest to homes on the west side of Copper Leaf Pkwy., to not build any single-family housing on the rezoned parcel (and to donate funds to DPS for any new multi-family housing), and to intensify the border buffers between the shopping center and homes on the southern end of the residential portion of the property.

Still, the proffers were not enough to sway the Planning Commission. The project's next step would be a hearing before the City Council for a final vote on the rezoning.

Comments

[Erik]

I tell you what, I've been home sick this entire week and I needed something to cheer me up. Suffice to say this post did the trick. Great stuff.

[Toby]

An excellent object lesson for prospective developers: if you work hard to include stakeholders in all stages of planning, and try to address their concerns in a conscientious manner, you are more likely to succeed. Yes, it takes more time up front, but this is more than offset by savings further down the development road.

[GreenLantern]

The controversy over the Brightleaf Commons development is a clear example of people NOT doing their research before buying a home. The developer has clearly stated intentions to build a shopping center zoned for on the property, and Google searches of the developer and zoning maps clearly brings up plans and articles for this.

THOSE OF US WHO LIVE NEARBY in subdivisions or rural tracts, other than environmentalist rabble-rousers like Ms. Motley-Pearson, those aformentioned folks who didn't do their homework, and those who want to maintain a fake rural lifestyle within 5 miles of one of the largest employment centers on the east coast, are widely in favor of having a shopping center with Harris Teeter, Home Depot, and the like. We're tired of having nothing in the eastern part of the county and having to drive across town or to Brier Creek (yes, that's in Wake county) to get what we need!

Jobs are scarce and home prices stagnant. Eastern Durham County needs more choices in retail, and we don't need to be sending our sales taxes over to county east of us. It's time for the City/County to get some backbone and approve the shopping center instead of deferring to a clear minority of dim-wits that don't represent the people on our side of town. This isn't Ninth Street, it's a typical suburban area that has typical suburban values--which don't include turning away every developer and shopping center that comes along.

[Seth Vidal]

GreenLantern,
If you want to express your views on the zoning approval, that's great. But it doesn't improve your case to insult the people opposing your position.

-sv

[NRG]

Great Post BCR! Very interesting how that meeting went.

Toby, I don't quite understand what you mean when you say "An excellent object lesson for prospective developers: if you work hard to include stakeholders in all stages of planning....you are more likely to succeed"

How exactly is a developer suppose to include future residents of a development in the planning process of said development before it is ever built? These developments get built and filled by new home buyers over a course of years, but the developer has to make his plans to submit to the county fo approval at the begining of the process. You can't involve stakeholders if the stakeholders don't even know they are stakeholders yet.

Sounds to me like a lot of people who bought in Brightleaf didn't do their due diligence.

~ NRG

[JSR]

GreenLantern: You are right in that people should do research before buying a home. Here are some comments and questions on the rest of your post.

You use the term "environmentalist rabble-rousers". Does this mean that you think a 430,000 sq ft commercial development has little or no impact on our water quality? If so, google "urban runoff".

You say "We're tired of having nothing in the eastern part of the county"... Some might say you should have done your homework before moving there.

You say "Jobs are scarce and home prices stagnant"... Does that sound like a good time to build a mega-shopping center that features a home improvement store as its anchor?

You say "It's time for the City/County to get some backbone"... Not giving the rubber stamp of approval for the type of development we've had since WWII is sign of having backbone.

You suggest a connection between dim-wits and 9th Street...you should compare the US Census track data on education levels in Durham County sometime, you might be surprised (you brought it up).

You mention having "typical suburban values" (a new term for me), yet you want convenient access to retail. Hmmm. If the suburbs fail in one area, that would be precisely it: convenient access to daily needs.

Just some food for thought.

JSR

[GreenLantern]

In reply to JSR:

You use the term "environmentalist rabble-rousers". Does this mean that you think a 430,000 sq ft commercial development has little or no impact on our water quality? If so, google "urban runoff".

--In nearly all cases, increased development creates runoff. Does this mean we stop building altogether just because some local activist living nearby with a blog "thinks" all developers are evil? I'm sure she finds it convenient to do her shopping at Brier Creek (which by the way is in someone's watershed)

You say "We're tired of having nothing in the eastern part of the county"... Some might say you should have done your homework before moving there.

--I've been living in the eastern part for over 10 years and we still don't have what developers and real estate agents have been promising in terms of retail and services, although Ravenstone Crossing is progress. The environmental acitivists opposed this shopping center, with specious arguments about runoff and water quality, but thankfully it got built. Again, ALL development creates some level of runoff, but that doesn't mean it will significantly affect wather quality in all cases. Would you be opposed to widening US70 to reduce pollution from idling cars, or would you be opposed because it could creat more runoff? There are always tradeoffs.

You say "Jobs are scarce and home prices stagnant"... Does that sound like a good time to build a mega-shopping center that features a home improvement store as its anchor?
--Are you kidding?? If a developer is confident enough to locate a new Kroger or Home Depot in an under-served part of the county, why don't you believe it would create jobs?? In this tight credit market, we'll be lucky to have any retail development in the next few years. But of course, YOU have a job don't you?

You say "It's time for the City/County to get some backbone"... Not giving the rubber stamp of approval for the type of development we've had since WWII is sign of having backbone.

--What I meant was that it's time the City/County start to ask the people who live in these communities what they want, instead of having to bend for every activist and blogger who shows up at city council meetings with their pet peeves. They should be taking into account the will of the majority and the overall benefits to their entire constituency

You suggest a connection between dim-wits and 9th Street...you should compare the US Census track data on education levels in Durham County sometime, you might be surprised (you brought it up).

--Well, don't assume a correlation between higher education levels and higher intelligence, judgement, or common sense. Seance, anywone?

You mention having "typical suburban values" (a new term for me), yet you want convenient access to retail. Hmmm. If the suburbs fail in one area, that would be precisely it: convenient access to daily needs.

--It's clear that most of the people commenting on this blog live in or near the area downtown, and tend to look down their noses at anyone who may just live 3-5 miles out. If you consider that suburban, so be it. We're not going to move in beside you, so get over yourself and your hip urban lifestyle. Fine, if that's your thing, but we can't all live downtown, nor can you expect the suburb to exist only in one quadrant. The eastern quadrant is growing, but underserved by retail. We'd appreciate it if you all stayed out of our business, unless you are directly affected.

[TrinityRez]

Trust me GreenLantern. I live in Trinity Park and there is definitely no correlation between level of formal education and common sense or perceptive insight into the way the real world functions (see Duke LAX fiasco for just one prime example). I cannot say that there is any empirical evidence to support my first hand experiences but there mostly likely is a reverse relationship between years of formal education and reality base common sense.

I grew up off Holder Rd(that means Durham native to the few people that can truly say such)in that area and there were farmers and blue collar workers that had a greater grasp on reality. These salt of the earth people were not snobs or thought they had to tell others what was good for them.