Landmark Staff Report

8/3/2019 Landmark Staff Report

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Z-2472STADIUM CAPITAL, LLC

THE LANDMARK PLANNED DEVELOPMENTCBW TO PDMX

STAFF REPORTFebruary 9, 2012


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RPO | g:\apc\staff reports\rezone\z-2400s\z-2472 stadium capital, llc - the landmark pd, cbw to pdmx.docx | STADIUMCAPITAL, LLC | CBW TO PDMX | February 9, 2012

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Z-2472STADIUM CAPITAL, LLC

THE LANDMARK PLANNED DEVELOPMENTCBW TO PDMX

Staff ReportFebruary 9, 2012

REQUEST MADE, PROPOSED USE, LOCATION:The owner/petitioner, represented by attorney Daniel Teder, is requesting PDMX zoningon approximately 2 acres in the City of West Lafayette for a six-story, mixed-usebuilding containing 250 apartment units with 600 bedrooms, 37,750 square feet ofground floor retail and a 295 space parking garage split between two levels. Theproperty is located at 720 Northwestern Avenue and is bounded by Northwestern,Dodge, Allen and Evergreen Streets, Wabash 18(NW) 23-4.

ZONING HISTORY AND AREA ZONING PATTERNS:In past years, there have been two significant rezoning petitions in the vicinity of thesubject property: Z-1278 established the Purdue Exponent Planned Development in1987 and in September of 2011, Z-2460 was approved for the 516 NorthwesternAvenue Planned Development. Construction on that mixed use building is expected tobegin this spring. The pattern established by both of these non-residential planneddevelopments is one of pedestrian-oriented, dense, urban redevelopment that isdesigned for easy access to campus. The 516 Northwestern Avenue PlannedDevelopment expanded on this theme by designing two front doors to the building,allowing the east side of the building that faces the New Chauncey neighborhood direct

access to the building lobby and the retail spaces on the ground floor.

With the exception of these two planned developments, the current mix of commercialand residential zoning surrounding the subject property has remained unchanged in thisportion of the New Chauncey neighborhood. Purdues campus and Mackey Arena aredirectly west of the site while R1U zoning lies to the east and north and CBW zoning liesto the south.

AREA LAND USE PATTERNS:On the northwestern portion of the block lies the suburban-styled Regions Bankbuilding, while on the southern portion of the block lies the Stadium Square shopping

strip center. On the eastern portion of the block lie a collection of small apartmentbuildings. To the north and east of the block are converted homes and apartments andsouth of the block is the bookstore site, gas station and other commercial uses. To thewest is the campus, Mackey Arena and Ross-Ade Stadium.

ENVIRONMENTAL AND UTILITY CONSIDERATIONS:City utilities and Indiana American water are available to serve the site.


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TRAFFIC AND TRANSPORTATION:Northwestern Avenue is classified as a primary arterial according to the adoptedThoroughfare Plan. The proposal calls for the vacation of the existing alley andremoving its curb cuts on Northwestern and on Allen Street. An ATM drive through isproposed with a curb cut entrance on Dodge Street and exits via the ground floor

garage access drive to Allen Street. The access to the single underground garage levelis off of Dodge Street. The garage levels do not connect internally. Public angledparking is being proposed along the north side of Evergreen Street and will be subjectto change based on the recommendations of a comprehensive traffic study to beinitiated if the project is approved.

A maximum of 295 parking spaces are being provided split between two levels with 78spaces in the ground floor parking area and 221 spaces in the basement level. Theproposed angled parking on Evergreen would remain public and would not count towardthe required parking for the project. The parking plan relies heavily on tandem andcompact parking spaces to increase the overall parking count and provisions are in

place in The Landmark Narrative to address resident car access to the tandem spots inthe event of an emergency.

Parking for the commercial aspect of the project was successfully negotiated with arange of 50 minimum to 80 maximum spaces that can flex based on the mix ofpermitted commercial uses found in The Landmark Narrative. As for residential parking,petitioner began the planned development negotiations with the assertion that many ofthe residents of this project would not be bringing cars. As staff had no supportiveevidence to reduce the traditional 1 space per bedroom standard that has beennegotiated in past planned developments, we asked for a study to back up theseassertions. A study was delivered to us and the Area Plan Commissions transportationplanning staff reviewed it and found many questionable assumptions and generalitiesthat left us unconvinced. We relayed our comments on the study back to petitioner andhave not heard back from him since regarding this matter.

Staff understood, given the sites proximity to campus, that there very well may be somestudents living onsite who would chose not to bring their own cars. But with noconvincing evidence to support the numbers petitioner was presenting, staff attemptedto negotiate a compromise by lowering the residential parking ratio to a minimum of0.75 spaces per bedroom, only if alternative transportation options were employed tomake up for the deficit in parking that the 1 space per bedroom standard required. Staffwas open to ideas and one transportation alternative we recommended as a partialsolution was car-sharing. A car-sharing program provides an alternative to thoseresidents who do not bring a car but still want the flexibility of car usage to make localtrips. It is similar to renting a car, except that it is only for short trips of only a few hoursor more and the car must be returned where it was originally parked. Staffs willingnessto do this was based on our own experiences with car-share programs in urbanenvironments and data connected with the ZipCar company which demonstrates that asingle shared-car can remove up to 15 vehicles off the road. With ZipCar coming toPurdue University in October of 2011, staff believed the community was poised to


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embrace an expansion of this program in a near-campus setting like The Landmark.Petitioner enthusiastically supported staffs idea and initially pledged that he wouldprovide his own private car-sharing program in the event ZipCar was not ready toexpand. After consulting with the executives in charge of the campus-based program atZipCar, staff was informed that until the campus program reaches a vehicle utilization

rate of 40%-43%, the company would not be ready to expand. The utilization rates arepresently around 25% and ZipCar does expect that rate to rise after some heavymarketing this year. Under a private car-sharing program that would be for the exclusiveuse of The Landmark residents, staff was willing to allow four shared-cars, whichequates to a 56 space parking credit (after 1 space is removed to park each sharedcar). Based on the 1 space per bedroom ratio, which would require 600 residentialparking spaces, the inclusion of the private car-sharing program would lower therequired parking to 544 residential spaces or 0.9 spaces per bedroom. As staff waswilling to lower the residential parking ratio to 0.75, or 450 residential spaces (if othertransportation alternatives were employed to make up for the deficit in parking that the 1space per bedroom standard required), that left 329 required residential spaces to

negotiate solutions for, since there would be 215 residential spaces already provided.

Petitioner, instead, rejected all of this (including the ZipCar program and previouslyoffered private car-sharing program, instead holding car-sharing out as an optiononly) and insisted that the projects 215 residential spaces (after you back out themaximum 80 commercial spaces from the total) would suffice for the residents of theproject. With 600 bedrooms and 215 minimum residential spaces, staff raised seriousobjections to the resulting 0.36 space per bedroom parking ratio. There is no residentialor mixed-use project in our community that even comes close to a residential parkingratio this low.

Prior to petitioner ending negotiations, staff conducted a survey of most of ourneighboring cities in the Big 10 in addition to Ball State University in Muncie, toascertain how they park projects of a similar nature in near-downtown or near-campusenvironments. The results, which were shared with the petitioner during negotiations,were revealing:

Michigan State University (East Lansing): 1.25 spaces / 1 bed unit 2 spaces / 2 bed unit 2.5 spaces / 3 bed or more unit Residential urban projects required to lease spaces in city garages

unless on-site parking provided.

Indiana University (Bloomington): 0.8 spaces / bed in the Downtown Edge zone 1 space / unit minimum 1 space / bedroom if located adjacent to single family home


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Ball State (Muncie): 2 spaces / unit (regardless of number of bedrooms per unit)

University of Michigan (Ann Arbor): 1.5 spaces / unit (regardless of number of bedrooms per unit)

1 space / unit for converted homes

University of Nebraska (Lincoln): 1.75 spaces / unit

University of Iowa (Iowa City): 1 space / efficiency, 1, and 2 bedroom units 2 spaces / 3 bedroom unit 1 space / bedroom for units with more than 3 beds

University of Illinois (Champaign):

0.5 spaces / bedroom 1 space / unit minimum 2 spaces / unit maximum Up to 4 bedrooms / unit maximum

University of Minnesota (Minneapolis): 0.5 spaces / bedroom 1 space / unit minimum

University of Wisconsin (Madison): 1 space / unit minimum to 2.5 spaces / unit maximum

Parking standards negotiated for each project under the citysConditional Use Permit standards within the aforementioned range.

What was even more revealing in all these cases, besides not seeing a single ratioapproaching The Landmarks 0.36 spaces per bedroom, was the fact that, with theexception of Muncie, all these cities have city owned and maintained public parkinggarages that assist in serving the parking demands generated by these projects. In theEast Lansing case, the city even goes so far as to require that residential projects in andnear the downtown lease spaces in the citys garages in order to meet the citys parkingrequirements. In Minneapolis, an ever expanding light-rail system is used to justify theirparking ratio of 0.5 spaces per bedroom with a 1 space per unit minimum. At 0.36

spaces per bedroom, The Landmark is unable to even park at a 1 space per unit ratio,which is the bare minimum in every city staff contacted.

The City of West Lafayette does not have the public parking infrastructure or thesuperior transit systems that these other cities have and on-street parking in the NewChauncey and Hills and Dales Neighborhoods is already heavily utilized. According tothe West Lafayette Police Department 13,314 tickets were issued to vehicles parking inthe vicinity of The Landmark site between May 2007 and December 31, 2011 and the


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problem has only worsened in recent months with Purdue increasing its parking fines to$35 while the citys fines remain at $15. It is simply cheaper for students to abuse therules on the citys streets than to comply with Purdues more stringent rules. While theissue of the citys parking fines is a separate matter from planned developmentnegotiations, what is clear is that the citys near-campus neighborhood streets are

increasingly desirable places for students to park and any new project should notexacerbate an already growing problem. Despite all of this evidence, petitioner refusedto increase the residential parking amount or to explore other transportation andbuilding design alternatives to meet staffs compromise position, and so the planneddevelopment negotiations reached an impasse.

STAFF COMMENTS:Originally conceived as a 15-story building, The Landmark went through severaliterations. From the beginning, staff strongly encouraged the redevelopment of thisblock and was excited to learn that petitioner had acquired the entire block afteroriginally showing us a 10-story proposal that did not include the Regions Bank site.

After withdrawing, at staffs urging, a petition to include a 400+ space satellite parkinglot three miles from the site in Tippecanoe County, petitioner returned with 6-storymixed use building with insufficient residential parking and an unwillingness to negotiateany compromise with staff on residential parking.

This unwillingness to negotiate the development standards for this planneddevelopment or to respect the standards set with previously approved planneddevelopments defies the definition of a Planned Development found in the Intentsection of the ordinance. UZO 2-28-1a maintains that: the Commission through itsstaff negotiates a specific development plan with the petitioner for PD zoning andrepresentatives of the checkpoint agencies. Staff and the checkpoint agencies werewilling to lower the 1 per bedroom ratio if alternative transportation options wereestablished, additional on-site parking provided, or the number of units/bedroomsmatched the compromise parking ratio. We proposed standards that made sense, weretruly innovative, and were at the heart of a planned developments purpose which is to foster innovative and diverse design in land development. (UZO 2-28-1a). Instead offinding common ground in the negotiation process, petitioner proposed a radical parkingplan that had no equivalent in our community or among the cities staff contacted. Andwhen staff requested documentation to prove petitioners assertions, we found it lackingon many fronts.

Despite the parking issues dominating the negotiations, staff did have comments on thearchitecture as well. While the central tower with its rooftop gathering space is anattractive feature and the open courtyards provide important open spaces, none ofthese features are visible from the streets. All the neighborhood will see is a singlemonolithic 6-story brick and glass block whose similarities with its surroundings end atroughly sharing the same roofline elevations as the soon-to-be-constructed 516Northwestern Avenue Planned Development two blocks to the south and Mackey Arenato the west.


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1. All sheets (other than preliminary plat) that make up the approved PreliminaryPlan;

2. PD construction plans per UZO Appendix B2-2;3. A final plat per UZO Appendix B-3-2 as applicable;4. Appropriate surety submitted with final detailed plans;

5. Plant schedule approved by the West Lafayette Greenspace Administrator;6. Recordation of the alley vacation shall be completed prior to Final DetailedPlan approval and recordation.

7. A traffic maintenance plan shall be submitted with the Final Detailed Plans,subject to the approval of the Administrative Officer of the City of WestLafayette.

8. A replacement of Section 13 in The Landmark Narrative concerning theshared-car program so that it shall read:

Shared-car programs are consistent with our vision of a pedestrian friendly,low impact and sustainable development. In order to justify our efficient

parking design we will implement a shared-car program. This program will notbe confined to only using ZipCar as one or other shared-car vendors may beincorporated into The Landmark, with the approval of the AdministrativeOfficer. If no shared-car vendor is available to implement the shared-carprogram, a private shared-car program shall be implemented by the owner ofThe Landmark. The Administrative Officer, prior to implementation, shallapprove the details of the shared-car program. Each shared-car in theprogram shall count for 14 required residential parking spaces, based on whatwould have been required had The Landmark been parked residentially at thetraditional 1 space per bedroom parking ratio; the Administrative Officer mayreduce required residential parking accordingly with approval of the shared-car program. With Administrative Officer approval a maximum of four shared-cars are allowed under a shared-car vendor program and all cars must beparked either on-site or on The Landmarks Evergreen, Dodge or Allen streetfrontages. Under a private shared-car program four shared-cars are required,and all shared-cars must be located on-site and be for the exclusive use ofthe residents of The Landmark. Prior to approval of the Final Detailed Plans,the details of the shared-car program shall have been approved by theAdministrative Officer. The shared-car program shall be in place prior toissuance of occupancy permits for the residential units.

If the Commission recommends approval of the petition, the rezoning petition moves onto the City Council subject to the condition.

If the Commission recommends denial, the rezoning petition moves on to the CityCouncil; however a recommendation of denial cannot include any conditions. In thatcase the Commission can then take a separate vote in the form of a recommendation tothe City Council that the Council, if it chooses to approve the rezoning petition, do sosubject to the condition which can be imposed by the Council at that time pursuant toIndiana Code Section 36-7-4-1512(a)(1).

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