The Chapel Hill Town Council held a meeting Wednesday, March 20 at Chapel Hill Town Hall. Here is a brief overview of their discussion.
Street Lighting at Booth Park
The town council unanimously voted to open a legislative hearing on a conditional zoning request related to the Booth Park development project located at the corner of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Estes Drive. The procedural vote was the first step in the approval process for Trinsic Residential Development, the project’s developer, to add lighting fixtures that exceed the illumination standards of the town’s current Land Use Management Ordinance (LUMO).
Trinsic Residential Development Manager Andrew Houck presented to the council, asking for their approval of a conditional zoning request regarding off-site lighting at the Booth Park development. Trinsic Residential Development could exceed the maximum offsite illumination standard along the northern property line if the conditional zoning request is approved.
The town staff and Houck confirmed that the owners of the adjacent property, Shadowood Apartments, expressed support for the conditional zoning, especially since some of the increased lighting will service a sidewalk connecting the two properties.
“The enterprise fixture would allow us to provide better lighting on those sidewalks, which allows for more safety, better circulation, [and] better connectivity between Shadowood Apartments and our apartments,” said Houck. “As a result, the residents of Shadowood can enter into our property and visit the 12,000 square feet of retail that we’ll have there, so it’s a net benefit for everybody in question.”
The council unanimously voted to open the legislative hearing on the conditional zoning request and will continue the hearing at the April 17 meeting.
To read more about the Booth Park development project, click here.
Close the Unmaintained and Unpaved Public Right-of-Way Portion of Old Hargraves Road
The council unanimously adopted a resolution to close the unmaintained and unpaved public right-of-way portion of Old Hargraves Road. The 1,200-foot road is about one mile east of UNC’s campus in the Hillcrest neighborhood. According to staff, the town established the right-of-way path 60 years ago, but it has gone unmaintained.
Whit Rummel was one of the neighbors who spoke at the meeting. A 30-year resident of his property adjacent to the path, Rummel said he started the petition to close the right-of-way path nearly 15 years ago.
“I have found one tub and two toilet remnants on it that people have left over the years, and I think it is certainly of no good to the town at this point. I think [myself] and a number of my neighbors would really enjoy having maybe an extra six feet of space on either side to be able to plant a garden or something like that. The reason I started this effort back in 2010 was because the bamboo on that strip is rampant, and we were trying to find a way to get rid of the bamboo, and here we are 15 years later and still trying, so that’s my two cents.”
Several owners of adjacent properties in the neighborhood provided unanimous support during the meeting, and staff said they did not receive any objections from adjacent property owners when notifying them of the prospective closure.
Legislative Hearing to Consider LUMO Text Amendments to the Stormwater Management Requirements
The council unanimously opened the legislative hearing on amendments to the stormwater management requirements. The amendments add conditions to the LUMO to account for 100-year storm events. It will formally vote on the amendments at the May 1 meeting.
In Mayor Jessica Anderson’s message on the town’s website, she said, “With these new regulations in place, new projects must capture, hold, and treat more rainfall which will help reduce downstream flooding and protect water quality. After negotiating this project-by-project for several years, it is a big deal that we now have this as our standard requirement.”
To read more about Chapel Hill’s ongoing LUMO rewrite, click here.
Photo via the Town of Chapel Hill
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