Belleville planners OK new site plan for 500 bl. of Main St.

A new, revised site plan for the 500 block of Main Street looks a lot different than the original plan for Belleville Main LLC approved last June by the Belleville Planning Commission.
At its regular meeting March 12, the commission unanimously approved the site plan revision, now called Belleville Main II, and stipulated that the plan for the area called Building C had to come back to the commission for approval once its use is determined.
Architect for developer Scott Jones is Wayne Hoppe of Van Buren Township who presented the new site plan and explained that the use and design of Building C is unknown at this time.
The change to the original site plan came after Jones purchased Lakeview Tavern and added that area to the site right up to the intersection south of the Belleville Bridge.
During an hour-long presentation and discussion Hoppe showed the commissioners details of the project. Jones did not attend the meeting.
“When my client purchased that parcel of land, the layout was revised drastically,” Hoppe said, adding it now had maximum street frontage.
He said most of the strip of stores along Main Street and the strip of stores along North Liberty Street will have entrances on both sides, from the street and from the parking lot in the middle.
Hoppe said he has designed a pedestrian corridor, where people can park in the parking lot and walk all around Building C. There will be bollards to keep vehicles from the walkway.
He said Building A, along Main Street, will be 10,410 square feet and contain retail and restaurants. Building B, along North Liberty Street, will be 12,420 square feet and contain retail and restaurants.
Building C is a two-story building with 9,300 square feet per floor — about 18,000 square feet — for as yet an unknown use.
Hoppe said this is the entryway to the city and when people come over the bridge, this will be the building they see first and it will be beautiful.
“It’s very, very important for the front door of Belleville,” he said.
“Form follows function. We don’t have a tenant. It could be a small grocery store or a restaurant and banquet hall. We don’t know what it needs.
“There will be outdoor seating for the restaurant in front” where diners will look across Doane’s Landing park and the lake beyond.
“We don’t really know what it’s going to be,” he repeated.
He said along the street there will be a six-inch curb, sidewalk, and another six-inch curb, which he said was less expensive than bollards and plantings.
The storm water system has already been put in place, but they will be making come revisions to fit the new plans.
He said all the buildings will have flat roofs to comply with the city’s ordinance.
Commissioner John Juriga, who is also an elected district library board member, said this project is three times the footprint of the new district library in the city and it has a smaller KSI (kilopound per square inch – underground storage unit). The library had to go by the Wayne County rules, he said.
DPW Director Rick Rutherford said the City of Belleville goes by Wayne County rules.
Commissioner Juriga said it cost the library $200,000 to build its retention pond and the taxpayers of Belleville, Sumpter Township and Van Buren Township are paying for it.
Hoppe said the project under discussion has volume within its pipes. That will be discussed under the engineering review.
“Tonight, this is just for layout,” he said. “We will follow what Hennessey says,” referring to the city’s consulting engineers.
He said the site will be graded so the water does go through the KSI, 750 gallons, and swirls, trapping pollutants.
Commission chairman Steve Jones said you can’t compare this project to the library.
“We’re going by the rules,” Jones said.
“It’s not fair,” Juriga said, referring to a smaller KSI required.
“The library is over and done with,” Chairman Jones said. “We are going to be following Wayne County standards. Whatever it would be, they would do. It’s not appropriate to discuss tonight.”
“I just want the water to be clean,” Juriga said.
“We all want that,” Jones replied. “Every project is different. Let’s let the engineers handle that.”
“As long as we’re going through the same process,” Juriga said.
“I will not let it go through any other process,” Jones said.
Commissioner Mike Renaud asked about how the streetscape in place will be handled.
Hoppe said it will be removed during construction and then replaced, like they did for the Davenport Suites on Main Street. Anything damaged is replaced, he said.
He said they will be putting in more landscaping than required by the city.
“We think it’s going to be beautiful,” Hoppe said.
Juriga asked about the air conditioning units and Hoppe said they will be on the roofs and will be shielded. When the library was being planned, Juriga vehemently objected to the library having to shield its roof units.
Juriga also said he wants more bike racks and Hoppe said they have designed seven all in one place, but, “We can spread them around.”
Hoppe said they will have a series of benches and trash receptacles around the building.
He said the floorplan for Building A along Main Street has a large tenant space at each end and a larger space in the middle. He said partitions can be removed to put the spaces together.
For Building B along North Liberty Street the spaces are flexible and the partitions can be moved around. He said there will be a tower in this building and a lot of windows. The building turns the corner there.
He said the drawing he used for Building C is a schematic and he doesn’t know if it will look like this.
Hoppe said they will have black, anodized window frames and doors and the awnings will be red and black. The buildings are brick and limestone.
Juriga asked about snow removal and Hoppe said it will have to be removed from the site, which is not unusual for an inner-city site.
Commissioner Becky Hasen said if a restaurant/grocery store goes in Building C, as suggested, they would have to carry their trash across the site to where the trash containers are located.
Hoppe said that would be an operational challenge to the tenant, but would be nice for the city to get the trash as far away from the restaurant as possible.
Commissioner Renaud asked about parking and Hoppe said the old plan had 91 or 92 parking spaces and the new plan has 101 spaces.
Hoppe said it depends on the uses of the buildings on whether they are meeting the parking requirements. He said if they take the second story off Building C, that would affect the number required. It depends on the use.
He said at this time they are asking the commission to approve the layout and, “We’ll be back with uses. We may have parking problems, maybe not.”
When asked, he said there were five handicapped parking spaces scattered around the site.
“The community had high hopes for a grocery store,” said Commissioner Randy Priest, asking if there could be a grocery store in Building C or maybe a small grocery in Building A and Hoppe said that was possible. There will be an elevator in Building C, he said.
Commissioner Renaud said there would have to be loading space for a grocery store and Hoppe said that requirement was based on street frontage.
Renaud said there would have to be a big space for loading and Hoppe said they can change the design according to the tenant.
There was some discussion about blocking the street by semis for loading.
Juriga asked if there was going to be a flagpole and Hoppe said with the tower and the monument sign planned, they felt adding a flagpole would be too much.
It was noted that the project needs rezoning of two lots that are part of the site: lot 276 which is B-1 and needs to be rezoned B-2 and lot 277, which is RM and needs to be rezoned B-2. Also, they need to have easements for the streetscape vacated, he said.
Colette McClinton of Main Street Flowers said semi trucks come through the alley behind her store for the carpet store near her and she wants Hoppe to make sure there is enough turning radius in his plans.
She said she is on the fire department and at the Davenport Plaza on East Columbia Avenue the turning radius is very tight. Hoppe also designed that project.
He said it meets the ordinance. Hoppe said the entrances planned on Main Street and North Liberty Street are 20′ wide entrances, as required.
Juriga asked if they couldn’t put in bioswales, like the library is doing.
Hoppe said the water table is 36″ below grade here and the bioswale doesn’t work.
Councilman Tom Fielder asked about signage and Hoppe said the stores will have small signs.
“My hope is that people will window shop all around the shops,” he said, noting the walkway is barrier-free.
The commission unanimously approved a motion to recommend to the city council the rezoning of the two lots and then unanimously approved the amended, previously approved site plan with the caveat that they will come back with plans for Building C.
“We’ll be back when we get somebody in C,” Hoppe said.
Although plans are to begin work soon, the project has to get approval for engineering, plumbing, and other things before construction can begin.
In other business at the one-hour-and-19-minute meeting, the commission:
• Re-elected Steve Jones as chairman and Michael Hawkins as vice-chairman for 2020;
• Approved the minutes of the Dec. 12 meeting, the commission’s last meeting held; and
• Heard Rutherford report that the commission had talked about looking at parking requirements. He said Carol Thompson, coordinator of the Downtown Development Authority, had done a study of the city-owned parking spots that he could bring to them. But, he said, the footprint is changing now and he thinks they should wait to consider future development and parking until after Fourth Street’s redesign is in place and the library parking lot is done.
Included in the commission information packet for the meeting was a Dec. 19 attorney’s opinion from city attorney Stephen Hitchcock that said Rutherford was correct in authorizing a building permit for work on the former car wash on East Huron River Drive. Hitchcock said the work on the existing footprint did not trigger site plan approval. At the Dec. 12 meeting, Rutherford was criticized for not making the owner file a site plan that would be brought before the planning commission.