The crosswalk on Liberty Street, looking west at Crest. (Photo by the writer.)

Ann Arbor City Council Sunday caucus (Aug. 16, 2009): Sunday evening’s lightly attended city council caucus reflected a light agenda for Monday. But light as that agenda is, it had not been published in the newspaper – as one caucus attendee pointed out to the three councilmembers present: Mayor John Hieftje, Sabra Briere (Ward 1) and Mike Anglin (Ward 5).

Even though the agenda itself is dominated with items like perfunctory rezoning – pedestrian in the sense of “ordinary” –  there’s a presentation to be made at the start of the meeting by Sue McCormick, director of public services for the city, that should draw some community interest. She’ll be giving council an update on the East Stadium Bridge situation. The bridge needs to be repaired or replaced.

At caucus, then, residents and councilmembers were free to focus on some items not on Monday’s schedule. And one common theme cutting across two different resident concerns as well as council discussion were pedestrian issues – pedestrian in the sense of folks on foot.

In other brief discussion, councilmembers indicated, in response to a question, that they had not contemplated re-voting the issuance of bonds that would fund the underground parking garage. The legality of the council’s February vote authorizing the bonds has been challenged by a lawsuit filed last week, which contends that the council violated Michigan’s Open Meetings Act on the evening it approved the bonds.

Also at caucus, councilmembers gave a public indication that they were contemplating possible council rules changes that would affect how email communications are handled during council meetings.

Pedestrian Issues

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King Elementary School Crosswalk

One audience member asked for an update on the installation of a crosswalk at King Elementary School, which she’d inquired about at a previous caucus meeting. Hieftje indicated that he had no new information yet, but did not expect that anything would happen before school started in the fall.

The resident told the mayor that city staff, in conversation with her, had expressed an interest in seeing the Ann Arbor Public Schools take responsibility for shoveling snow off the sidewalk in the winter.

Pedestrian Right-of-Way Ordinance

Another audience member reported having attending a recent public meeting about installation of a pedestrian refuge island at 7th and Washington. He suggested that while refuge islands and roundabouts might help a particular intersection, it would be more effective to think about the broader educational goal of reminding motorists of the ordinance that gives pedestrians the right-of-way. Signs of the kind that Traverse City uses, he said, would be a step in the right direction.

By way of background, the pedestrian right-of-way ordinance in Ann Arbor reads as follows:

10:148. Pedestrians crossing streets.

(a) No pedestrian shall cross a street at a location other than at a crosswalk into which vehicle traffic is then restricted by a traffic control device unless such crossing may be done safely and without interfering with motor vehicle and bicycle traffic on that street.

(b) No operator of a motor vehicle or bicycle shall interfere with pedestrian or bicycle traffic in a crosswalk into which vehicle traffic is then restricted by a traffic control device.

(c) When traffic-control signals are not in place or are not in operation, the driver of a vehicle shall yield the right-of-way, slowing down or stopping if need be to so yield, to a pedestrian crossing the roadway within a crosswalk when the pedestrian is on the half of the roadway on which the vehicle is traveling or when the pedestrian is approaching so closely from the opposite half of the roadway as to be in danger, but a pedestrian shall not suddenly leave a curb or other place of safety and walk or run into a path of a vehicle that is so close that it is impossible for the driver to yield.

The ordinance itself has been criticized in recent months on the Washenaw Bicycling and Walking Coalition Google Group for not providing right-of-way to pedestrians in the whole crosswalk. Wrote Matt G.:

Carsten Hohnke is working hard to have our pedestrian ordinance changed to provide right-of-way in the entire crosswalk (anything less is NOT actually a right-of-way). It’s a great place to start. We need to show him support by helping to educate other council members and city staff.

Hohnke is one of two representatives from Ward 5 to the city council.

At caucus, Hieftje said that the 7th and Washington intersection warranted specific attention, but that the broader educational angle was one that the city was also pursuing. He pointed out that the city had allocated $10,000 for non-motorized safety education. That funding was authorized at council’s June 15, 2009 meeting.

Hieftje reiterated what Eli Cooper, the city’s transportation program manager, had said at the June 1, 2009 council meeting about one fundamental challenge of motorist education in Ann Arbor:  Half of the drivers on the roads of Ann Arbor don’t live here.

Alley to the east of the McKinley Towne-Hall Centre, shown in an Ann Arbor city planning staff report. (Image links to larger version).

Mid-Block Cut-Through

During caucus discussion among councilmembers, Sabra Briere (Ward 1) reported to her colleagues that she’d had a meeting with Sandi Smith (Ward 1), Ray Detter, who’s president of the Downtown Citizens Advisory Council, and  Steve Kaplan about the alley to the west of the Liberty Square (Tally Hall).

Some background on the alley. At its Jan. 7, 2008 meeting, the city council approved a PUD rezoning for McKinley Towne Centre-Liberty at 515 E. Liberty St.

The planning commission deliberations on the issue included considerable discussion of closure of the alley on the west side of the parcel that was proposed for the PUD by the petitioner.

The planning staff report includes an analysis of the alley on the east side of the parcel as an alternative pedestrian path from Liberty to Washington:

Staff finds that this alley does offer pedestrians a mid-block passage between East Liberty and East Washington Streets, but only for those “in the know.” It does provide a useful function and makes closing the existing alley on the west side of the proposed PUD site less concerning. However, it is not an ideal space to safely convey pedestrians, mostly because of the portion that is the theater loading dock. Staff would be concerned about promoting its use for the general public.

Looking north from Liberty Street down the alley to Washington Street. The black posts at the alley's entrance are bollards. (Photo by the writer.)

Briere said there was concern that the bollards that had now been installed would cause people to perceive the alley as not public. She was also concerned that any delivery trucks entering the alley from Washington Street to service the new retail locations would have to back their way out onto Washington.

Briere also wondered if an alley that was lined its entire width with cafe tables – one possible use if the adjoining retail space just built by McKinley houses a restaurant – would be conducive to conveying pedestrians between Liberty and Washington.

The bollards that have been installed can be removed – there’s a bolt visible at the base – but are not the kind that can simply be run over by an emergency vehicle if that need should arise, Briere said.

Parking Garage Bonds

The recent lawsuit filed by the Great Lakes Environmental Law Center against the city of Ann Arbor contends that the city council violated the Michigan Open Meetings Act when it authorized the issuance of general obligation bonds at its Feb. 17 meeting. The suit asks for declaratory relief that in part invalidates that council decision:

(c) Enter an order which invalidates City Council’s approval of the site plan for the Parking Garage and the bonding to fund the project which occurred at its meeting on February 17, 2009 ;

At its July 20, 2009 meeting, council authorized a change from tax-free municipal bonds to taxable bonds – the increased cost being more than offset by the Build America Bond Program. The Chronicle had inquired at the July 19 caucus whether that change would require an additional 45-day window, during which citizens would have the opportunity to circulate a petition that – if successful in achieving signatures from 10% of registered voters – would force a voter referendum on the bond issuance.

When the council considered the matter at its July 20 meeting, Briere explained that night that they’d learned no additional 45-day period would be required, because it had been satisfied with the Feb. 17 vote. But what if the council on July 20 had simply taken a new vote on the bond issuance? That vote would have taken out of play the contention in GLELC’s lawsuit that the Feb. 17 vote was not valid.

Council could conceivably re-vote the bond issue even now, as a strategy to take the financial piece of the equation out of jeopardy. So the question The Chronicle asked the three councilmembers present was: Has anyone given any consideration to undertaking such a re-vote?

They had not contemplated such a re-vote themselves, nor were they aware that anyone else had, either.

Possible Council Rule Changes

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) said that Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), who chairs the council’s rules committee, had asked Briere to request that a work session be held on the topic of council ethics and rules. Briere reported that she’d done that.  However, the next available work session would be in October. September’s work session is already committed to a joint meeting with planning commission on A2D2 zoning. October was a long time to wait, said Briere.

Mayor John Hieftje indicated his preference for just putting the rules changes on the agenda for the council’s Sept. 8 meeting and discussing them at the table. Briere said she’d like to get a draft of the proposed rules changes out and available for people to look at as soon as possible. Hieftje said he thought that should be possible as early as next Tuesday.

The rule changes, Briere indicated, would address email, as well as an issue with newspaper publication of notices and agendas. Council will likely eliminate its own rule that requires it to publish its agenda in the local newspaper.  The FY 2010 budget, which council adopted earlier this year, aimed to save $15,000 by no longer publishing the counci’s agenda in the newspaper.

Notices Published in Newspapers

One resident addressed councilmembers on the issue of publication of notices and agendas in the newspaper. She noted that public hearings for the planning commission and the historic district commission had been published in “the Sunday paper, such as we have now,” but that the city council agenda had not been published there.

She said  the public hearings for planning were required by the city code. She’s right – from Chapter 57 of the code for the city of Ann Arbor:

A written notice shall be sent to the petitioner and to the property owners and residents within 300 feet of the boundary of the property not less than 10 days before the Planning Commission hearing indicating the time, date and location of the hearing. A notice of the hearing shall be published in a newspaper of general circulation at least 7 days before the hearing. [emphasis added]

And council has a rule that requires the publication of its agenda:

The approved agenda for all meetings of Council, including Work Sessions, shall be published in a newspaper of general circulation in the City no later than the Sunday prior to each meeting, except those meetings called less than six days prior to a meeting.

The caucus attendee suggested that the reason council did not publish its agenda was because it cost a lot of money to publish it. Based on the budget discussions earlier in the year, that’s in fact the case.

The caucus attendee also pointed out that the definition of what counted as a newspaper required that it have been published at least a year, in order to qualify as “legitimate.” Here’s the state statue statute to which she was alluding – MCLA 691.1051:

The term “newspaper” as used in any statute of this state, except the revised judicature act of 1961 relative to the publication of a notice of any kind, shall be construed to refer only to a newspaper published in the English language for the dissemination of local or transmitted news and intelligence of a general character or for the dissemination of legal news, which

(a) has a bona fide list of paying subscribers or has been published at not less than weekly intervals in the same community without interruption for at least 2 years, and

(b) has been published and of general circulation at not less than weekly intervals without interruption for at least 1 year in the county, township, city, village or district where the notice is required to be published. A newspaper shall not lose eligibility for interruption of continuous publication because of acts of God, labor disputes or because of military service of the publisher for a period of not to exceed 2 years and provided publication is resumed within 6 months following the termination of such military service,

(c) annually averages at least 25% news and editorial content per issue. The term “news and editorial content” for the purpose of this section means any printed matter other than advertising.

Joining Hall as signatories to the letter are Henry L. Henderson (Natural Resources Defense Council), Stuart Batterman (environmental health sciences at the University of Michigan), David Yves Albouy (economics at the University of Michigan), Doug Cowherd (Sierra Club-Huron Valley Group), Tom Whitaker (Germantown Neighborhood Association), as well as two other Ann Arbor residents.

In an emailed response to The Chronicle reacting to a previous draft of Hall’s letter circulated two months ago (which covered substantially the same issues), Leigh Greden (Ward 3) stated: “A lawsuit alleging that the parking garage violates MEPA would be frivolous,” contending that the standard suggested by Hall would make any construction project non-compliant with the MEPA.

Still, based on background sources for The Chronicle,  the project has been slowed somewhat by the extra unknown of a lawsuit. We’ll track this dispute as it evolves, and will hopefully be able to gain some insight into any planned next steps from councilmembers at their Sunday night caucus.

Meanwhile, what exactly is the MEPA standard to which Hall appeals in his letter to the Ann Arbor city council? Two key aspects to consider in evaluating a MEPA claim are (i) standing, and (ii) cause. The first relates to those who are allowed to bring a suit in a MEPA case.

Legal Standing

In relevant part, the section from Michigan Compiled Law 324.1701 reads [emphasis added for readability]:

(1) The attorney general or any person may maintain an action in the circuit court having jurisdiction where the alleged violation occurred or is likely to occur for declaratory and equitable relief against any person for the protection of the air, water, and other natural resources and the public trust in these resources from pollution, impairment, or destruction.

But in a July 25, 2007 Michigan Supreme Court decision, the court set a possible precedent for narrowing the set of possible plaintiffs in such cases, by applying traditional requirements for legal standing. That is, there must be an injury to the plaintiff, and that plaintiff’s injury must be different than the injury to the public at large. The 2007 case involved a water bottling plant operated by Nestlé Waters North America that threatened to lower the levels of two nearby lakes, a stream and three wetlands.

In that decision, the court ruled that the group filing the lawsuit could sue based on damages related to one of the lakes and the stream, because some members of the group owned property located directly on the lake and the stream. But because none of the group owned property on the second lake or any of the three wetlands, nor did they enjoy the direct benefit of those properties, the court said the group could not sue based on damage to those bodies of water, because the group lacked the legal standing to do so.

… the record below does not indicate that plaintiffs used or had access to these areas or that they enjoyed a recreational, aesthetic, or economic interest in them. Plaintiffs failed to establish that they have a substantial interest in these areas, detrimentally affected by Nestlé’s conduct, that is distinct from the interest of the general public. The absence of a concrete, particularized injury in fact is fatal to plaintiffs’ standing to bring a MEPA claim.

So while the MEPA itself appears to grant legal standing to anyone at all to bring a lawsuit based on “pollution, impairment, or destruction” of the environment, the precedent set by the 2007 case allows for some restriction on the range of people who can bring a lawsuit under the MEPA.

And that restriction depends on the relationship of the potential plaintiffs to the resource that is alleged to be in danger of “pollution, impairment, or destruction.” That relationship needs to be relatively direct: The court rejected an “interconnectedness” argument based on the entire planet’s hydrology, on pain of giving “anyone but a Martian” the standing to contest water withdrawals like Nestlé’s. It’s not enough, the court said in a previous case (Lujan v Defenders of Wildlife), to use a resource in an area roughly “in the vicinity” of the jeopardized resource.

One resource identified in Hall’s letter as jeopardized by the planned Fifth Avenue underground parking structure is air – partly in the form of increased CO2 emissions from automobile emissions caused by motorists driving to and from the structure. So with respect to the issue of legal standing, one question on which a court might deliberate would be: Is there a party to the lawsuit who has a recreational, aesthetic, or economic interest in the air that is likely to be directly affected by the garage? A second question on which the court could deliberate with respect to legal standing would be whether the question of CO2 air pollution is sufficiently similar to water hydrology to reject any claim to standing based on the global warming phenomena.

With respect to the first question, the locations of the letter’s signatories’ homes could be germane: The geographic area of the Germantown Neighborhood Association abuts the same block on which the underground parking garage is to be built; Albouy, the UM economics professor, lives on the 300 block of South Division, directly adjacent to the proposed structure.

Hall’s letter indicates that CO2 emissions from automobiles are not the only source of environmental damage he might argue, should the case be litigated:

… the construction of a new parking structure of the size proposed will require a massive quantity of materials, including concrete and steel. The manufacture and synthesis of these construction materials require vast amounts of resources and energy, with associated pollution, impairment, and destruction of the natural environment.

The Case for Environmental Damage

Based on the space allocated to the topic in Hall’s letter, he’d likely place more emphasis on the the case for environmental damage from automobile CO2 emissions, than on destruction of resources associated with construction of the facility.

The line of reasoning for environmental damage based on CO2 emissions goes roughly like this: more vehicle miles traveled means more CO2 emissions, and more CO2 emissions translates into more global warming.

Once built, the underground parking structure – with 677 spaces in Phase I – will lead to increased vehicle miles traveled (VMT) on the streets surrounding the structure that provide entrance and exit to the structure. The expected increase in VMT at those locations is reflected in two kinds of city documents: (i) in the site plan analysis done for the underground parking garage project by the city, which notes the expected increase in traffic surrounding the structure, and (ii) the financial plan analyzing the feasibility for issuing bonds to fund the structure, which assumes an overall increase in the number of vehicles using the Ann Arbor parking system downtown.

Part of the context of the VMT discussion is that an increase in VMT is counter to the city of Ann Arbor’s stated environmental goals. It’s also one of the areas of weakness identified in the city’s State of the Environment report. The number of per capita VMT has been trending upward from 2000 to 2005.

Does increased VMT lead to increased C02 emissions? For now, at least, Hall said in an interview with The Chronicle, increased VMT correlates with increased CO2 emissions. Until there’s a predominance of electric vehicles on the road, with batteries charged with solar arrays or windmills, more VMT means more CO2, he said.

What’s the significance of CO2, given that various natural processes emit CO2? At least the legal significance of CO2 could be affected by the April 17, 2009 proposed endangerment finding by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that greenhouse gases (of which CO2 is one) contribute to air pollution that may endanger public health or welfare. The EPA finding is “proposed” because it must now go through a public commentary phase.

It’s that proposed finding, together with a scientific consensus on global warming, that convinces Hall that the case he might bring would be easier to argue now than it would have been a year ago. Even considering that, Hall allows that it’s not an open-and-shut case. Otherwise put, it’s not about “routine enforcement,” but rather a new kind of case that could establish new precedents.

Defense and Settlement

Hall contends that either in advance of the parking garage construction – or as a defendant in an environmental lawsuit – the city of Ann Arbor needs “to engage in a thorough and objective evaluation of alternative ways to meet the defined need (for example, providing downtown Ann Arbor with transportation to support vibrant commerce).”

What is the defined need in this case? At the Feb. 17, 2009 city council meeting, the public commentary as well as council deliberations focused on symptoms that indicated a lack of sufficient parking. Those symptoms ranged from the anecdotal (complaints by potential patrons of downtown merchants about a lack of parking), to a parade example of a business that was reported to have relocated away from downtown Ann Arbor due to a lack of parking (Xoran Technologies), to some numbers on structure usage (84% capacity during peak periods) and excessive waiting times (greater than 30 days) to obtain a monthly permit.

The anecdotes will likely be familiar to readers of The Chronicle.

The example of Xoran Technologies was introduced at council’s Feb. 17 meeting during public commentary by Newcombe Clark, who works with Bluestone Realty Advisors, and who reported trying to negotiate a deal to provide 20 dedicated parking spaces for the growing company. Xoran, which makes advanced medical imaging equipment, will move from their current location at Miller and First in in the summer of 2009 to Pittsfield Township. At their current location, The Chronicle counted 53 spaces designated by signage for Xoran employees.

During council deliberations, Leigh Greden (Ward 3), who was involved in the attempt to negotiate the 20 additional spaces through the Downtown Development Authority, seemed to portray the Xoran decision as turning only on the 20 parking spaces. Based on a cursory inquiry by The Chronicle, it’s not clear who on Xoran’s part might have introduced a requirement or desire for the specific number of 20 additional parking spaces as a condition for staying downtown.

According to Jackie Vesitvich, head of communications for Xoran, with whom The Chronicle spoke by phone a few days after council’s Feb. 17 meeting, the company needed additional space in general. The company had been very interested in staying in the downtown Ann Arbor area, she said, because they loved being there – but the decision to move to their new Pittsfield location was based on the need for additional space, and specifically a particular configuration of office and warehouse space to accommodate their operation to FDA requirements. An extra 20 parking spaces, she allowed, would have been nice.

In an email sent to The Chronicle in response to an inquiry about the 20 spaces, Clark clarified that there were numerous “deal points” in addition to parking that led Xoran to decide to move to Pittsfield Township. However, he wrote, “All that is certain is that they had a strong desire to stay downtown and a very specific and small lack of parking was the stated reason at the time to look outside of the downtown.”

Asked at the podium during the Feb. 17 meeting what the usage numbers were for the parking system, Roger Hewitt, chair of the Downtown Development Authority’s operations committee, indicated that during peak periods the usage was at 84% of capacity, and that at 85% of capacity, there was already perception that a structure was full. [The DDA administers the city's parking structures and surface lots through Republic Parking. The organization's chair, Jennifer S. Hall, is married to Noah Hall.]

In light of the discussions and deliberations at council’s meeting, then, the need to add parking capacity by approving an underground structure was based on symptoms of a lack of parking capacity.

The parking study for Ann Arbor prepared for the city in 2007 by Nelson\Nygaard, a consulting firm, alludes to some of these symptoms in its final recommendations. With respect to permits, the study says:

6. Maintain sufficient parking supply to allow purchase of monthly parking access instrument on demand, or following a waiting period of no more than 30 days.

And with respect to the need to woo particular companies (like Xoran), the study says:

Coordinate on Economic Development Strategies: The recent Google deal (400 free parking permits offered to lure an influential employer to Downtown) points to the reality that parking access can play a major role in economic development. The City, the Chamber of Commerce, and the DDA should therefore meet early in the process of such deals to determine the potential volume of permits being discussed, the potential value returned to the City for providing this incentive, and to begin developing an approach that follows the established Downtown Parking Policy.

In a phone conversation on May 14, 2009, The Chronicle spoke with David Fields, principal with Nelson\Nygaard, about a basic approach to determining when to add capacity to a parking system. Although Fields worked on the Ann Arbor study, we were asking him to comment in complete generality, not to weigh in on the question of whether to build the underground parking garage at Fifth Avenue. And in that spirit, he suggested that every community will determine for itself how much parking it wants.

One possible step, he allowed, was to decide how much access to an area the community wanted to provide – that is, how many people did a community want to transport into and out of an area. From there, the community could decide what portion of that access was feasibly provided by various means: single occupancy vehicles, bus, rail, bicycle, etc.

In his letter, Hall argues essentially that the feasibility of providing access to downtown Ann Arbor through various other means besides the proposed underground parking garage needs to be analyzed by the city in order to defend against the prima facia case that the underground parking structure will damage the environment. That is, in response to the lawsuit that he might bring, Hall cites one allowable defense specified in the MEPA, which reads in relevant part:

The defendant may also show, by way of an affirmative defense, that there is no feasible and prudent alternative to defendant’s conduct and that his or her conduct is consistent with the promotion of the public health, safety, and welfare in light of the state’s paramount concern for the protection of its natural resources from pollution, impairment, or destruction.

Settlement

When The Chronicle interviewed Hall, he suggested that a 2000 2008 case involving the Sierra Club and the city of Stockton, Calif. might provide a model for a settlement of the Ann Arbor case. There, the city of Stockton took two steps. They (i) set forth a whole range of plans to reduce CO2 emissions and vehicle miles traveled, and (ii) made a specific investment in bus rapid transit. Hall is not wed to the idea of bus rapid transit in particular, but says that it’s important to make some commitment to an initiative that the federal government is interested in helping to fund.

Hall notes there’s no federal stimulus money being offered for parking structures – because, he says, they’re totally out of line with what the Obama administration wants to do. The only part of the underground parking garage bond issuance that’s receiving matching funds from non-local sources, Hall points out, are the streetscape improvements (to enhance pedestrian experience) along Fifth and Division streets. For that project, the Michigan Department of Transportation has awarded a $1 million grant.

During the last couple of months, Mayor John Hieftje  has often made a somewhat similar point about federal versus local funding in connection with the East Stadium bridges. The city of Ann Arbor  would not want to issue bonds, or use the local street repair millage to repair the bridges, he has pointed out, because the state and federal government place a high enough value on such projects to offer funding for them.

Editorial Aside

Hall has lent to The Chronicle nearly 1,000 printed pages of material related to the underground parking structure obtained under the Freedom of Information Act from the city of Ann Arbor. Some of that material includes email exchanges among city councilmembers made during their council deliberations. Hall’s letter mentions that material as possible Open Meetings Act violations. Having read through it, the content seems to fall into two categories: (i) adolescent humor, and (ii) apparent “backchannel” discussion of issues before the council, which raises more serious concerns.

We have arranged to have the material digitally scanned as images, and converted to text. To the extent that’s a successful arrangement, we’ll make the material available here on The Chronicle, and follow up as appropriate.

Ruppel’s role at the meeting was not just to run the computer. He was second up to speak after the project leader on the city’s side, Chris Cheng, ticked through a list of his own questions, which included (i) the possible connection of the garage to the old YMCA site [answer: no connections now but designed for future connections on three levels] (ii) location of the speed ramp along Fifth Avenue and its relation to existing curb cuts at the federal building [answer: more discussion required, but the project team felt the ramp accommodated the existing curb cuts] (iii) the accommodation of future development on or above Library Lane – the proposed new east-west connector, which will split the block [answer: no such accommodation is planned] and (iv) the potential glare from 2-3 foot-candle lighting on residential structures along Division Street [answer: use of wall-mounted lighting and shields could address the issue].

Next came Ruppel, who dove into the nitty-gritty of natural features, ranging from storm water control to the impact on an existing landmark elm tree. Discussion of the storm water management for the site included the question of whether the storm water from Fifth Avenue should be included for capture in the storm water detention system. From Ruppel’s memo to the project team:

The garage structure under Fifth Avenue is indicated not to be captured by the storm water detention system, per the Drainage Area Plan on Sheet SPA-6. Please provide storm water management for the entire parking structure.

Ruppel’s memo also includes suggestions for how to achieve greater consistency with the Washtenaw County Drain Commissioner’s recommended best practice of using infiltration (letting it soak into the ground) as a part of the storm water management system, which would be suitable in light of the site’s Fox Sandy Loam soil. Ruppel also recommended exploration of ways to reduce the amount of pumping neccesary for the proposed storm water detention tanks, by locating them in areas where they could gravity drain to the public storm sewer.

Some of the city staff, who could not attend the meeting in person, sent their concerns along in memos. A memo from Patrick Cawley, for example, made specific some of the concerns about layout mentioned by Cheng at the start of the meeting. For example:

The southern driveway to the post office has its sight line blocked by the speed ramp. It will need to be shifted and likely need to truncate the bike lane.

Meetings between Cawley and the project team will be scheduled between now and Sept. 24, when revisions to the site plan are due, to clarify identified traffic issues.

Park planning sent along a question about whether the proposed class B bicycle parking would be covered. Answer: yes, they’re located next to a stairway with an extended roof canopy overhang that will cover the racks.

Landmark elm tree just in front of the carriage house to the rear of the A.L. Noble house on Division Street.

In addition to the landmark elm tree mentioned by Ruppel, the trees proposed along Library Lane drew the interest of Kerry Gray, the city’s urban forest and natural resource planning coordinator. She discussed with Deb Cooper of Beckett & Raeder the proposed density of trees along the lane, suggesting that the spacing between them needed to be doubled in order to ensure long-term health of the trees. Cooper, for her part, said she was responding to public input that made clear there was an expectation that Library Lane would be something “very special,” and said she was confident that the trees – to be grown in structural soil that would extend under the sidewalks – would thrive. One of the specific challenges to tree plantings in connection with the project is that any trees will be growing on top of an underground parking garage. Gray and Cooper agreed that they would meet individually later to discuss required revisions.

As the meeting wound down, The Chronicle asked Ruppel if he knew the exact location of the landmark elm he’d mentioned. Yes. He first fired up an aerial image and zoomed in on the tree, then switched to Google Streetview, which offered a [view from Division Street] into the back of the A.L. Noble House lot, which allowed The Chronicle to navigate to the tree’s location after the meeting. Ruppel gave us the caveat that from that view, the elm was obscured by a tree of heaven, which stands just in front of it, when viewed from that angle.

What happens next

• Resubmission of plans due Sept. 24
• If resubmitted plans adequately address city staff questions, the project could come before planning commission’s regular meeting on Oct. 21

Aerial view of block where the proposed underground parking garage would be built.

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