Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutZ-6781-A Staff AnalysisDecember 21, 2000 ITEM NO.: 6 FILE NO.: Z -6781-A NAME: Telecorp - Tower Use Permit LOCATION: 4500 Alpine Lane OWNER/APPLICANT: Ralph and Melissa Farish PROPOSAL: To obtain a revised tower use permit for a Wireless Communication Facility with a 312.5 -foot triangular self-supporting lattice style tower on property zoned R-2, Single Family Residential, located south southwest from the current terminus of Alpine Lane, south of Colonel Glenn Road. ORDINANCE DESIGN STANDARDS: 1. SITE LOCATION: This site is located approximately 1000 feet south- southwest from the current terminus of Alpine Lane, south of Colonel Glenn Road. 2. COMPATIBILITY WITH NEIGHBORHOOD: This site is zoned R-2, Single Family Residential, and is surrounded by R-2 zoning. The area is rural consisting mostly of large tracts of land, many of which are still undeveloped, and some contain site -built and/or manufactured homes. There is currently no road to the proposed site. The distance from the proposed site to any other existing structure is well beyond the height of the tower. Staff believes that given the rural nature of the proposed site, that even with the style and slightly increased height of the proposed tower and slightly reduced setback, the proposal should not have an adverse impact on the surrounding area. This site is not served by any neighborhood association. However, Staff notified the closest association, which was The Spring Valley Manor Property Owners Association December 21, 2000 ITEM NO.: 6 (Cont.) FILE NO.: Z -6781-A of the public hearing. The applicant notified all property owners within 200 feet of the public hearing. 3. ON SITE DRIVES AND PARKING: An unimproved 1647 linear foot access road was constructed to the site from the current terminus of Alpine Lane. Parking for maintenance vehicles is adequate. The site would be unmanned. 4. SCREENING AND BUFFERS: The applicant was not required to screen or landscape the site originally. The site would be brought into compliance with the current ordinance standards for landscaping and screening when Alltel collocates on this site. 5. PUBLIC WORKS COMMENTS: No comment. 6. UTILITY AND FIRE DEPT. COMMENTS: Water: No objection. Wastewater: No sewer service required for this project. Southwestern Bell: No comments received. ARKLA: Approved as submitted. Entergy: No comments received. Fire Department: Approved as submitted. CATA: No comments requested. 7. STAFF ANALYSIS• The applicant acquired a Tower Use Permit (T.U.P.) from the Planning Commission on January 6, 2000 for a Wireless Communication Facility (WCF) with a 300 foot triangular self-supporting lattice style tower with supporting equipment cabinets on a 100x100 foot leased area. The approved T.U.P. included setback variances for VA December 21, 2000 ITEM NO.: 6 (Cont.) FILE NO.: Z -6781-A a 236 foot set back to the west and a 30 foot setback to the south for the tower. Normally the tower would have to be set back from the abutting residential property lines the height of the tower. The proposed equipment location met the required setbacks for R-2 zoning. Alltel Mobile applied to collocate on this same tower. During the review of the collocation request, Staff discovered from the drawings submitted by Alltel that the height of the tower and the location of the equipment were not constructed -as originally approved. The applicant has requested to amend their Tower Use Permit to allow the facility to remain as currently constructed, with a 312.5 foot tall triangular self- supporting lattice style tower with supporting equipment cabinets located on the northwest side of the tower instead of the northeast side of the tower. The current setback to the west is 234 feet and to the south is 20.83 feet versus originally approved set backs of 236 feet and 30 feet respectively. When the original request was made the property owner to the south opposed the location because he said it would be located only 100 feet from the prime spot for a future house on his property to the south. He felt this tower would negatively impact the view from, and value of, his property. Staff still supports its original belief that this is good location for a single tower, which can provide the widest coverage and support multiple users. Therefore, that would mitigate the impact of the style and height of this tower on the surrounding area. While it is unfortunate that the actual construction of the facility was not as originally approved, Staff believes the revisions would not create a significant change in the impact of this WCF on the surrounding area. 3 December 21, 2000 ITEM NO.: 6 (Cont.) FILE NO.: Z -6781-A 8. STAFF RECOMMENDATION: Staff recommends approval of the revised tower use permit subject to compliance with the following conditions: a. Comply with the City's current Landscape and Screening requirements for WCFs. b. Only sign allowed would be one with a small message containing provider identification and emergency telephone numbers. c. Only lighting allowed would be that required by State or Federal law, and that required for safety and security of equipment. Any lighting must be down shielded and kept within the boundaries of the site. Staff also recommends continued approval of the lattice style variance, and approval of revised variances for the height of 312.5, and reduced setbacks of 234 feet to the west and 20.8 feet to the south. SUBDIVISION COMMITTEE COMMENTS: The Subdivision Committee did not review this revised proposal. PLANNING COMMISSION ACTION: (DECEMBER 21, 2000) Randal Frazier, attorney for the applicant, was present representing the application. There was one registered objector present. Staff presented the item with a recommendation for approval subject to compliance with the conditions listed under "Staff Recommendation," paragraph 8 above. Jim Lawson, Planning and Development Director, commented that the discrepancies necessitating this revision were discovered during Staff review of the site plan for an application for the collocation of a second antenna on the existing tower. Therefore, it was decided to bring the site back to the Commission for review and approval before any additional antennas were approved on this tower. He added he did not 4 December 21, 2000 ITEM NO.: 6 (Cont.) FILE NO.: Z -6781-A believe the mistakes were made intentionally, but were simply errors which occurred during construction. Chair Adcock expressed her concern that there is not a specific formal building permit and inspection process for ensuring that approved issues are constructed as approved in the extraterritorial zoning area. She added that there have to be consequences for non-compliance; otherwise more non- compliance will occur and people will build cell towers and other things the way they want to. Commissioner Faust stated that she didn't see the layout dimension differences to be large enough to be of great concern. Commissioner Rahman stated his main concern was about the height difference because a tower is built to a specific height as stated in the specifications. Therefore, he felt that -if it was higher than approved that the specifications had to have been wrong and purposely stated higher than approved. He stated his concern about the issues of how to ensure compliance in the construction phase and what to do in the case of non-compliance. He also stated his concern about setting a precedence for granting variances. He added that allowing one variance would promote more variances. Commissioner Berry commented that the Commission must be careful that a remedy to deal with compliance is not self- defeating by discouraging collocation. He added that he could live with the 3-4% mistake made in this case, in order to allow Alltel to collocate. Mr. Frazier clarified that the setback to the south was off by 9 feet and that the height was "potentially" taller than approved. He continued that the construction process is not an exact science and measurement methods differ. He felt the differences in height were due to a portion of the footings supporting the tower being constructed above ground, (3.6 feet above ground), and part of the antenna array projecting above the top of the tower. He stated he believed the tower itself was probably 300 foot tall by itself, but these other physical elements caused the final height of the total structure to exceed 300 feet. He acknowledged that the ordinance height is based on the distance from the ground to the, top of the antenna array, but construction crews don't 5 December 21, 2000 ITEM NO.: 6 (Cont.) FILE NO.: Z -6781-A understand that difference. Mr. Frazier said he asked in the application for the liberal figure which Telecorp's surveyor showed, to be sure the actual total height was covered by the variance. Mr. Frazier stated he believed this height to be higher than the actual physical height. He added that the Alltel drawing showed the distance to the top of the antenna array to be 299.5 feet tall sitting on a 3.6 foot concrete footing for a total of only 303 feet. He agreed that they did make a mistake on the setback, that the tower is 9 feet closer to the south property line than it should have been and they were sorry for that error. However, he added that he didn't feel that difference would have a large impact at that location. He also stated that they have instructed their engineers to pay particular attention to locating the structures correctly in the future. He apologized for the mistakes that were made. He concluded by stating that he felt since the tower was there, no one had complained about it since it was constructed, the area is rural, and there are no residences close to the location, that the best thing to do would be to approve the revised site plan as submitted. Commissioner Lowry asked if the mistakes were made in the plans/drawings or in the construction. Mr. Frazier stated the mistakes were made in construction. Commissioner Lowry also asked Mr. Frazier for his suggestions as to how to prevent these mistakes on the front end. Mr. Frazier responded that he felt that the existing inspection process for those instances where a building permit was required would address accurate siting. Mr. Lawson suggested that Staff place more emphasis on making sure applicants are clear that the height measurement is from the ground to the highest element whether it's the tower or the antenna array. He added this could be done by stamping permits and plans with that statement, plus verbally emphasizing the point. Commissioner Lowry concluded by stating he felt the mistakes were not intentional, and the project was done in good faith. Walter Nelms, adjacent property owner to the south, explained his concerns. First, the tower did not meet the ordinance - required setback of the height of the tower from adjacent residential property in two directions, to the south and the west. He added that his property is the abutting property in both of those directions. The tower was originally to be only 30 feet from his northern property line and now it's even closer. His second concern was that because of the tower's location, that there was very little area on his 5 acre December 21, 2000 ITEM NO.: 6 (Cont.) FILE NO.: Z -6781-A property south of the site that the tower would not strike if it fell over. Chair Adcock asked Mr. Nelms what he felt should be done about this situation, what would be a fair penalty. Mr. Nelms began with the comment that penalties happen after the fact, and that prevention was better. He stated that he felt that since he was unable to attend the original hearing, the item should have been delayed so he could have discussed in person his objections and suggestions. He added that in his original letter of objection he stated that there were other locations on the Farish's property that had the same or higher elevation that would have been agreeable to him. However, the location next to his property was chosen and that other than the letter he submitted, he had no recourse since he had to be out of town during the hearing. Commissioner Berry asked Staff if the "fall" line for towers was measured to the property line or to structures on adjacent property. Mr. Carney from the Planning Staff responded that the dimension asked about is considered a setback, not a "fall line" or "fall zone", and that it was measured to the adjacent property line not structures on the adjacent property. Three motions were made. The first was to adopt the Staff recommendation to approve the variance for the height of 312.5 feet. The motion passed by a vote of 6 ayes, 2 nays, and 3 absent. The second motion was to adopt the Staff recommendation to accept the setback variances to allow the tower to be 20.8 feet from the south and 234 feet from the west property lines. The motion passed by a vote of 7 ayes, 1 nay, and 3 absent. The third motion was to adopt the other Staff recommendations and comments for conditions and collocation issues stated in the agenda report. The motion passed by a vote of 8 ayes, 0 nays, and 3 absent. Mr. Lawson asked that the record reflect that the applicant had been offered the standard opportunity to defer this item since there were only 8 Commissioners present and he chose not to defer. Commissioner Lowry strongly recommended to the industry and Staff that this problem not arise again or he might not look upon it again in the same manner. 7 December 21, 2000 ITEM NO.• 6 (Cont.) FILE NO.: Z -6781-A Chair Adcock asked if there was not some way that the City and County could work together to ensure that the rules and regulations are followed in the City's Extraterritorial Zoning Area. Commissioner Earnest suggested that the Commission consider during the next year some sort of consolidation of City and County planning functions to deal with this and other planning issues. He was aware of locations where that process was working in other parts of the country. 8