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People with the means move from lesser neighborhoods into the new housing allowing people with even lesser means to move into the old rundown place. Sounds like Ann Arbor. Not unless we are trying to attack the track the better off Ipsilani township. And then the second person who was involved in these discussions said um this is about how housing becomes affordable over time as new housing ages and that's how Ann Arbor will eventually arrive at significant affordable housing perhaps in three decades. In the meantime, the new comprehensive plan will facilitate blockbusting for willing and eager rich developers who will be able to buy up relatively cheap single family lots and convert them to multiple houses buildings. From home ownership to everything rental, the great shift in wealth from individual families to large private equity interests brought to you by the city council. It's a kind of latter-day urban renewal.
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If it's two units on a single property, it doesn't comply with zoning. It would require um an ordinance change and the question would be would you do spot zoning and spot zone just that? Are you okay by answer? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'll leave it at I'll leave it as a comment. I would suggest that that that statement could use some rewriting. Um on the Union Lane property, um it's actually Union Lane, not Union Avenue. Union Avenue is Route 71. You said it's at the intersection of Union Avenue and Route 71. I would suggest it should be Union Lane and Route 71. Uh, where do I find that? It's it's the the part that talks about the barrel proper the barrel hall property on page uh 13 second line the first paragraph. Union Avenue and Route 71. Union Avenue is Route 71. It should just be changed to Union Lane, please, if you will.
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The city paves the way for private equity to take over the city and then private equity rewards the virtue signaling politicians with generous pack contributions. No matter what few limitations might be put on developers in terms of height, massing, setbacks, etc. is pretty meaningless as we have witnessed already. All the developer has to do is propose a pud or a planned project housing uh project. Sorry. Anyways, you understand this is not verifiable data. Thank you. Thank you. Uh Mark Scurbo, 2017 Fair Street. Um some people have expressed concern about new development increasing impervious service area and I wonder if folks have that same concern about the sea of parking in front of Maple Village or Arborand. is free parking right in front of the big box store or public good that we should legally mandate. Until very recently, we required parking lots to accommodate every shopper that might visit during the holiday season.
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Um page 15, two family homes units for sale. Uh oh, I'm sorry. I already did that one. [Music] Uh, Higgin the down on page 19, the Higgins Avenue redevelopment quarter. You might want to make that the proposed Higgins Avenue. The way I read it, it was as if it already exists, but I'll leave that to your discretion. Also, I'd make a comment as to what may or may not be included. what you put on the I mean again since since the public wasn't privy in the you know the online to the appendixes what was put up tonight uh showed a couple properties that um uh went off of uh Higgins Avenue and went back and had budded uh Uklid uh was it Uklid Lane or Uklid Avenue but it didn't include all the properties on Uklid. I would suggest that it would probably be appropriate to include everything that abuts um Uklid in that in that proposed redevelopment.
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So, why wouldn't we want to use that same logic to allow enough homes in the city to house every person who wants to live here but can't afford to do so? Allowing homes to be stacked vertically increases the amount of land area available for green space, trees, and storm water detention. That's why we should allow for greater density in the transition zones. It's a green choice. Some people prefer to live in more carbonintensive detached homes, and that's okay. But in areas of the city where multif family housing already exists and is sufficiently far from detached housing, we should not limit height. Currently, the plan proposes height caps in the transition zone, including next to hub zones. This doesn't make sense to me. We cannot legislate the creation of a downtown with the outdated wedding cake concept. Uncap heights in the transition zone away from the low-rise zone or aim for a UDC that's fewer than 300 pages by combining transition and hub into a single city district with a built-in taper.
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I think it would fit well, but I'll leave that to your thoughts. Thank you, Mr. Dick, if you just wrap it up. Yes, sir. On um uh on page 21, Bel ordinances advance multigener general generational family continuity goals. Again, I'd suggest that's a reach and then some. Um, on page 22, my last comment, first parag first line, COA subsid, you reference COA's substantive rules. COA doesn't exist, therefore they have no substantive rules. I'll leave that to you if you feel it's editable. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Burke. Anyone else have any comments with respect to the application that's being heard this evening? Sure. Come on up, sir. John Tini, 8:15 Rathjen. Um, I'm addressing my comments to the Rathjen Road property, which is block 6202, lot 3 that is steeply sloped and well vegetated. I think we can use common sense, good common sense to know if that vegetation is removed and replaced with substantial imperous cover of a street, 25 town houses, driveways, all of that.
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At the last meeting, there was some discussion of unique flavors of transition zone to accommodate different uses. Planning manager Leonard stated that some uses are not appropriate on walkable corridors. I hope that this comment refers to uses that require large single building volumes which would make street frontages that aren't human scale. It's reasonable and not that we'll require separation between walkable residences and some uses. Some people would love to live next to or above a bus depot or a reusable container washing station or a thrift shop. Please don't include language that suggesting separating uses. don't imply that some areas of the city can't be walkable and don't make the city district needlessly restrictive. Thank you. Thank you. Hi, I'm Dina Kurs and um I uh live on uh Provincetown Court um north of M14. I've lived in Ann Arbor on and off since 1979 when I came here as a graduate student and I served for a quick minute on the energy commission back in the early 2000s.
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It will cause more offsite runoff which in the previous applications by Mumford were not shown to have been uh well managed. And that's Mumford reduced an initial application from 12 homes as you remember to 11 and then adjourned the application again. Uh and here we are looking at the criteria from the planner. I have not heard who owns title. Uh Mr. Mumford or Mumford companies may have a contract or may have had a contract. So I don't know that's available. Uh is it suitable? um not in that neighborhood where you're going to cost 25 or more, maybe 50 vehicles if you say two per dwelling unit in a quiet intersection. Is it developable? You have a stream entering wetlands. We've already marked P1, which is shows the runoff, the storm water from lot three onto lot two to the coil property. and I ask that that be part of this record.
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And one of the issues with um city planning in general um or cities deciding what to do in their communities is that we are um influenced by state law and some of the things we cannot do um because of state law. But when I was on the energy commission, I um understood that a lot of the housing that was going up on South U, the developers were proposing to do things um with solar, with uh different kinds of um energy u um containment with the student housing. And I think that when things went from energy to planning and then the developers and whatever um those kinds of things did not happen. And so my concern with this framework of cons comprehensive plan is not so much the um development or densification, but what I heard last night at the library meeting was people talking about thoughtful densification.
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So it it is not uh compatible in terms of motor vehicle traffic or storm water which is already overwhelming and flooding the neighboring property. Uh so I would say to you before we're downstream I know we keep hearing about the planning board later will be presented with site plans and so on. This property is there's a reason why it's never been developed. It's steeply sloped with a stream entering wetlands and during storm water incidents it overruns the uh the next the adjoining property and 25 to 50 motor vehicles as Mr. Thbold said is unsafe at that intersection. Thank you very much. Thank you Mr. Jini. Any other comments um with respect madam come on out. I'm uh Betsy Bower. I live in Barkley Woods at 5 Hickory Court 5A. Uh and I am also commenting about the Rathon Road uh to uh support what he just said.
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And I think that's a lot of what I'm hearing here in terms of I don't think we want every place that is dense to look like Beakman apartments on um on uh Broadway. I think that we want attractive development. I think that we want development that is sustainable, that is wellbuilt. I think affordable housing should give people the opportunity not only to live in non fossil fuel places but to have access to beautiful outside areas. And so I'm not sure I haven't like read the plan. Um but I'm not sure how those principles, those ideals are incorporated in the plan. I don't know that solar access zoning is incorporated in the plan. And I think that that's really important when we're talking about sustainability. So, thanks for listening. Thank you. Hello. Hi, planning. Hi. Uh, today I am just a girl standing in front of planning commission asking you to legalize more housing.
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I live at the very end of of my street uh of Hickory Court. Uh and it goes very steep slope down um onto what I believe is his property. It may bay back up to your road on the intersection of Rasten and and Ranken. And I see I've only lived there for a very short time. I'm there seasonally, but I see that there's a great deal of erosion to the point where cars can park for guest parking. Uh there the street the road is starting to slope down into this runoff. I'm very very concerned about the environment there. It's a very sensitive environmentally sensitive area. There is a a big drop and there is the stream back there. I just it's not suitable for tearing down all these trees and developing on that. I would ask that all of you walk that area or come drive to the dead end where I live and you can see the the erosion there and how I think it would be dangerous to further erode it.
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I've heard a lot of comments today about uh studies that haven't been cited that have been cited from people who saying that studies say certain types of things or that they don't say that at all. And there's a lot of debate within uh studies within planning and political science about whether or not certain policies work and how that shifts. However, um I want to draw our attention to a recent publication titled public comment and public policy. Um it's published by Alexander Stan in the American Journal of Political Science volume 69 issue number 22 earlier this year. Um this is a friend of friends. He actually came to the University of Michigan last year um to talk about work he was doing on Ann Arbor. Um that work isn't published yet. I wasn't able to attend his talk unfortunately because I had to teach my own classes.
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At least what's existing there without excavating could help support it. Still needs to be built up. But you need trees and roots and shrubs and natural growth uh to maintain the landscape and it is eroded already and any development there will really seriously eroded more. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Uh Virginia, come on up. Virginia Loftton, South Street. Um, I I just have a couple of comments. Many of us just started hearing about this affordable housing stuff. I would make it a stretch to say it's even been a year. Um, we just got the first plan, I guess, two weeks ago or the or the presentation at the at Burough Hall at the last planning board meeting. And in that very short amount of time, we got a number of very creative ideas from the residents who were at the planning board meeting. Those ideas actually resulted in some changes to this plan, including the changes to Borie Avenue and the putting the affordable housing at the municipal building.
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But this recent publication does give us some food for thought. One of the things that Sam found in studying decades of data in San Francisco is that public comment is often not representative of a society. So when people talk about who is being listened, who is showing up, he says that most public comments are white, they're going to be wealthier, and they're often going to be homeowners. And in fact he finds that often planning commission at least in San Francisco makes decisions that defer to those um those demographics of people who may not be representative one of the people affected by various developments or who have interest in them. I think that public engagement could be better but I'm glad that it's ongoing. I would ask that we make some of these meetings more available to people with children. 5:30, 5, 3:00 to 5:00 in the afternoon is not a good time for anyone with kids.
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I would like to say, imagine what we could have done if we had all known about this for a year. But it feels like this has been secretive and nobody has been sharing information.
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That's really hard. If you are retired, you can come out and do stuff like with that. But not parents who are concerned about being able to have their children live somewhere safe. I'll also say that many of my friends who live in Ann Arbor have young children. They have young children. They have no cars or one car. And when they were looking at housing, they were thinking about affordability, but also about safety. A man earlier mentioned that his child unfortunately was affected by lead poisoning. I have multiple friends in Ann Arbor whose children have similarly been affected because they were living in older rental housing. In some cases, landlords were incredibly responsive. In others, a friend had to move because the landlord refused to effectively remediate things. She's living in newer housing. She and her family are very happy. I want it to be possible for everyone to have access to different types of housing.
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And I have to say I'm surprised that nobody on the planning board has any questions about this plan. It's it's very concerning. Nobody on the planning board has been to Rathjim Woods and taken a look Yeah. at what that property is. So I am disappointed. And I don't know, Mr. Clark, did you say you are not legally required to post those appendices online? There's no requirement to post anything online. But you know that residents have been asking meeting after meeting after meeting to please make these plans available to us. We go to planning board meetings and the the proposals are all turned away from the audience. we can't see. And if you can't make time to go to Burough Hall and review these paper copies, then you don't get to see it. So, that's not okay. You're hiding information from residents. And the one thing I will say about the March 23 housing element plan that was adopted by the planning board, I'm pretty sure nobody knows about it, but I do think it's important to memorialize that while the plan was adopted, the bureau did not submit the plan to superior court.
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In my neighborhood, I live on Woodland Drive in the Dickin neighborhood right by Pioneer. There's a forplex three houses down. There are ranchstyle houses next to two-story buildings. It's a really cute neighborhood. And actually, I didn't even know the forplex was a forplex until someone told me that it was. And my head didn't explode. I didn't die. In fact, there are usually fewer cars parked in front of the forplex than there are in front of many of the single family homes on the street. There is lots of possibility and lots of air between the world ending and things staying the same and stagnating. Thank you so much. Thank you all. Hi, my name is John Godfrey and I'm really want to second what Sarah said because I think she's exactly right. I think that diversity of contribution to a planning initiative that a city undertakes is fundamentally important and it should happen at the earliest stages.
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And that makes us uh subject to developers who are praying on us now. That should have been done. So, I think it's important to make sure that everybody knows that they didn't do it's a failure of leadership in this town. Okay. Um, oh, ma'am, come on up. Jerry Coyle, 811 Raptin Road. I have pictures here of flooding in my yard that I'd like to have the lawyer document. And I'd also ask all of you to come look at the property. It doesn't award 25 town houses. And if you see the wetlands and you see how sloped the property is and you think in your mind how much it will cost him to develop that property and how much money he'll have to charge for those town houses while he's ruining all the street because the water runs right down Wrath Road, goes right into a stream behind the golf course.
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