2026-10-19 - Zoning Board

Yes. We can start the meeting, David. Okay. I'm co-host now. Yes. Okay. Thank you. I'd like to welcome everyone and call tonight's zoning board meeting to order. I'm David Stein, chair of the zoning

board, and it is 653 on October 19, 2026. We apologize for the delay in beginning the meeting. The members of the board and the staff are holding this meeting by Zoom video conference, and the public

is in attendance both on the video conference and by telephone. I'd like to do a roll call of the board and the staff. Bill Morris? Here. Roseanne McManus? Here. Jerry Bozak? Here. Keith Walker? Here.

Peter Rustin? Here. And now for the staff, Ralph Blessing? Here. And Vanita Mater? Here. Good. We have everyone. The board's microphones will be open throughout tonight's meeting. The applicant's mics

will be open during the public hearing when their application is being heard. However, I would ask the applicants to please mute their mics for not speaking in order to reduce background noise. The

first part of tonight's meeting is the public hearing, during which the public will have an opportunity to speak. Each member of the public will be muted until it is your turn to speak. Here's the

procedure for the public to let us know that you would like to speak. If you came in through Zoom, please use the raise your hand function, and you will be unmuted when it is your turn to speak. If

you called in on one of the telephone conference call phone numbers, please press star 9, and this will raise your hand, and then star 6 to unmute when you are called on to speak. When members of the

public speak, please give us your name and address for the record. The board requests that members of the public limit your comments to three minutes so that everyone will have a chance to speak. If

you have a problem with trying to speak or raising your hand or something else like that, send an email to Benita Mater. That's V-M-A-T-H-U-R at stanfordct.gov, and tell her that you're having a

problem, and she will do her best to resolve it. This meeting is being recorded and will be posted on the Zoning Board's website. You can find the agenda for tonight's meeting and the meeting

applications and other materials by going to our website, www.stanfordct.gov/zoning. We will now begin the public hearing. The first item we have is application 226-27. It's a zoning text change

continued from our previous meeting on September 28th. The purpose of this text amendment is to implement the changes required by Public Act 25-01 with regard to residential parking requirements and

to update and streamline the mobility section in alignment with the city's comprehensive plan. When we finished the hearing on this last time, we had requested from the staff several items to give us

a better idea of the parking situation in the city, and I think we've received all of them. Ralph and Vanita, is that your understanding that we got everything we had asked for? Yes, everything should

be posted. Everything we received from the traffic department should be available online. However, the transportation department is not available today. They have to go to the Board of

Representatives. So if there's any additional material or any other questions you have, we would be happy to relay that to the transportation department. Why don't we go around and see where the

Board's thinking is here. Roseanne, why don't you lead off? Well, because a lot of material came today, I certainly am not ready to vote on anything. It's going to take me weeks, and I'm going through

and comparing it to some things that were in the traffic study. And I was wondering, I think it's going to take a long time to go through some of the new things that are being asked of us. Can we

separate out what the state has required that are the easy approvals for us to make and move on to the new things that Stanford wants to do separately? There's just a lot of questions I have about a

number of things in the changes. I really think that Springdale and Glenbrook need more attention, and we need to remove them from some of the discussions because of the parking and the west side as

well. I did note, Ralph, from your email that the mitigation, there's lots of room to get from those numbers to the 4%. But there's so many different things that I'm going to be questioning on the new

requirements that don't have anything to do with the state changes that I was just wondering if we could separate them out and vote on the state changes and give us some time on the request that

you've made on the other, so that Luke has made on the others. I didn't know how anybody else felt about that. Yeah. Okay, well, Bill. Yeah, I think it's a good idea. I think some of the changes which

are not required by the state appear to me to be a little out of sync with the parking study was recommending and, as Roseanne said, I think it's gonna take a while to sift through all this, a lot of

information here. And I don't think we should want to brush through this because I think, as I said, our first meeting regarding this matter, if we make a mistake, there's no way to change this. So I

think we gotta be very careful that we do this properly and very thoughtfully and not rush through this. So I agree with Roseanne. I agree, and I'm glad that the senior members of the board feel the

same way. I thought it was just a little overwhelmed going through all this material or just kind of got back and was going through it. And I really appreciate the time to sift through that as well.

So I think it's a great idea. So thank you both for starting off that way. Keith, where are you at? Well, I'm a junior member, but I agree. Yeah, I wasn't at the meeting, but I did spend the time to

listen to the entire meeting. There were some things on there that were definitely pretty head scratching. And to the other board members' points, I think it takes some time to go through it. And I'd

like to see it separated out. I'm sorry, Peter. As a mere alternate, I also agree that we need some more time to go through all this stuff. There is a lot there. And I agree with Roseanne and Bill. As

written, there are some troubling items in there, not the state requirements, but the non-state requirements that I think reduce parking more than would be good for Stanford, which means I think as an

overall proposal, it sounds to me like it would have trouble at this point passing the board. So I would, I see Bill nodding. So I'd suggest we separate it out. Let's get the state requirements

passed, increase the mitigation areas to cover more of the Glenbrook and Springdale and the west side. And then let's maybe even have a pre-app conference where the board just talks about what the

proposed changes are in parking, going down what the ideas are, and just see where we want to come out. I know we have reduced parking over the past year or so. So it's not as though it hasn't been

touched. So let's, you know, in light of what our current requirements are, I think we need to spend some time discussing as a board. I think your idea about a meeting just to discuss this with the

staff and Luke, obviously, after we've had time to review what came today, like, you know, I was just, I mean, I haven't really taken a hard look at those maps, but I thought to myself, somebody

builds a 16 unit building on the west side and doesn't have any parking, you know, it just would be awful. Right. And that's, I think, I think you're right. The major issue is that buildings without

parking will send their residents out on the street to compete with the neighbors. Right. And everything we hear is that street parking is very tight in Stanford. Your study agrees with that theory,

by the way, it, it did. Yes. And it also neighborhoods they're worse than others in some neighborhoods where there isn't any public parking or even parking that could be shared, you know, the west

side doesn't have any. Yeah. And each side is worse. So, Ralph, what do you think is that can we separate this out into two, at least separate out into the state mandated requirements and deal with

those first. So, you want us to prepare basically a text or version of the text that only has the state requirements in it. Because we could pass that fairly quickly. And then we can, because that

one. Right. It would be fairly quick and then all of the other things we can have a discussion at the board to talk about what we want to see in a draft. Okay, we can we can definitely prepare

something. Do we have a time limit on when we have to. No, it's because it takes precedent anyway right. It's a city application. So, it took effect, July one I think. Yeah. Yeah, we already. Already

over the work right right. The thing is that we don't have already. We don't have the mitigation areas and that that's important to get in there or otherwise we're stuck with the 16 units. The 16

units everywhere. That's, that's the downside is that as long as we don't have any defined mitigation areas, we basically have to allow every development with less than 17 units to move forward

without parking or reduce parking whatever they proposing. So, what is the best way to handle this application. Do we continue it and just wait for a revised draft. Would you prefer to, to refile

Ralph what's your. I mean, what we can do is basically prepare a draft that only contains the changes that are required by the state statute and take everything else out. Okay, so wouldn't require

refiling. Don't think so. Well when you think about it all it is going back to what we currently how it's, it's not an expansion. It's not an expansion of scope. Right. So, as long as we only

basically reject changes that are proposed then it shouldn't be a problem. We can't add any new changes. Yeah. Okay. Okay, so then at this point we will continue the application. Correct. Do we want

to also make sense because transportation isn't available tonight. But, you know, right. I think we have meet people from the public who wanted to speak to be, do you want to go to that before you

continue to the next meeting. Well, it sounds like we're about to do a major rewrite of this. I don't know board. What do you think, is there benefit to hearing from the public. No, because some of

the comments didn't make it may not be applicable to what we're actually going to look at and vote on. And Luke's not really here to answer their questions. Right. Yeah. Good point. So, you want to

continue it to next week. Is that important you want to just push it out to several weeks out in order to give time for the revised application staff. I think we could prepare something and get enough

time to digest it. I mean, we can, we can move it to next week, and if it's, if it's not possible if it turns out to be more complicated than expected, then I think we can, we can continue it next

Monday. I think two weeks wouldn't be wouldn't be a problem, but because of the holiday and and having the next meeting next Monday. It's a little bit, it might be a little bit tight you might be able

to to do it, you know that. I, I think, you know, you even if you could get it by later this week would there be enough time for the board to review it comfortably, but let's let's continue it to next

week and then we'll just, as you say, we'll just see how that goes. Right. So, application two to six dash two seven is continued to the next zoning board meeting, which will be held on October,

twenty six, twenty, twenty six at six thirty pm on zoom and our apologies to anyone from the public who is here tonight to speak on this. But please come next week. The next application we have is

application two to six dash two oh, which is a zoning board text change. The purpose of this text changes to align the structure of the ML light industrial zoning district regulations to the other

district regulations to add protections for a budding residential districts and establish urban design standard. No major changes to density and other bulk or other use standards are proposed this one

staff is working on some possible changes to this text change. So why don't we continue this one as well. We will continue it application two to six dash twenty will be continued to our next meeting

on October twenty six, twenty, twenty six at six thirty pm on zoom. You want to read the planning board letter into the record or wait until next week. You mean for this application. Yeah, this is a

continuation already. Oh, okay. Yeah, sorry. Sorry. Now we're on to new applications. We can't play in board letters and the first ones we have our application two to six dash oh nine and two to six

dash ten with relate to the McDonald's. Oh, nine is McDonald's real estate company eleven oh three East Main Street map change applicant is seeking a zoning map change from the current CN neighborhood

business zoning district to the CO limited commercial zoning district. And the companion application is application to two six dash ten McDonald's real estate company eleven oh three East Main Street

special permit applicant is proposing to install a second drive through lane including installation of springboard canopy free browse menu board and an outdoor digital menu board reorganization of the

parking area and other related site improvement. Roseanne, could you please read the two planning board letters to this June tenth twenty twenty six to Mr. David Stein chair city of Stanford zoning

board regarding CD application two to six dash zero nine McDonald's real estate company map change. Mr. Stein and members of the zoning board during its regular meeting held on Tuesday June ninth

twenty twenty six the planning board reviewed the above captioned application referred in accordance with the provisions of the Stanford zoning regulations. Mr. Stein is seeking zoning map change from

the current CN neighborhood business zoning district to the CL limited commercial zoning district Raymond Rizzio Russo and Rizzio LLC made a presentation and answered questions from the board. After

brief discussion the planning board unanimously recommended approval of ZB application to two six dash zero nine and found this to be in general harmony with the m u one mixed use neighborhood center

future land use category sincerely and also dated June tenth twenty twenty six to Mr. David Stein chair city of Stanford zoning board regarding ZB application number two to six dash 10 McDonald's real

estate company special permit to Mr. Stein and members of the zoning board during its regular meeting held on Tuesday June ninth twenty twenty six the planning board reviewed the above caption

application referred in accordance with the provisions of the Stanford zoning regulations applicant is proposing to install a second drive through lane including an application of springboard canopy

pre browse menu board and an outdoor digital menu board reorganization of the parking area and other related site improvements Raymond Rizzio Russo and Rizzio LLC made a presentation and answered

questions from the board. After brief discussion the planning board unanimously recommended approval of ZB application number two to six dash 10 with a recommendation the applicant replace excess

parking spaces with landscaping and patio area, specifically three parallel parking spaces along east main street at the north end of the race crosswalk would be converted to landscape area and on the

southern end of the raised crosswalk shift the handicap spaces to the east and expand the patio adjacent to the building by one parking space. Planning Board found this request to be in general

harmony with the MU one mixed use neighborhood center future land use category sincerely Stanford planning board, Jennifer gets no chair. Thank you. Attorney Rizzio I'm assuming you'll be presenting

tonight. Actually, actually chair it's gonna be me attorney Bruce so attorney Rizzio is on. Okay, I'm sorry. In chair, you want to handle both these applications together as one. Yes, presentation.

Okay, great. So good evening chair members of the board Chris Russo with Rizzio LLC offices at 10 sasco Hill Road in Fairfield here on behalf of the applicant. Last day we're here on to related

applications for 1103 main street, a zone change from the CN to the CL, and a special permanent permit to modernize the existing drive through with a second side by side drive through lane to orient

you know, share my screen should come up so this is a survey of the property the site is on. I'm sure you're all familiar with it but it's on the southeast corner of East Main Street. It's on

Blatchley Road, it's a little over 35,000 square feet in total. It features an existing two story McDonald's building, it's a little over 3200 square foot building that's been operating here for about

40 years. You know, I stated the current zone and CN, which neighborhood business and we're proposing CL which is limited commercial. We do have experts with us tonight. Our traffic engineer from DDP

who submitted the traffic study on the special permit application is with us, as well as our site engineer from core states that can answer any kind of detail questions you have regarding engineering.

The theme tonight is simple, this application does not add a single square foot of building, it takes a restaurant that already exists with a single lane drive through, whose business is now more than

70% drive through, and fixes the problems that come with an outdated single lane drive through, and add an additional lane for my client to more efficiently process its customers and prevent issues

like cars backing out onto East Main Street, which occurs with the current configuration. It reduces our parking area to a number that's sufficient for the actual demand of the site, and it's

compliant with the regulation. Also allows us to make some site improvements which I'll go through, including proper pedestrian access to the restaurant. So first with regards to the zone change. The

site is currently located in the CN district drive through is prohibited in the CN, but it's permitted by special permit and CL. And this change will, if approved will eliminate a 40 year old

nonconformity, you know eliminating nonconformity is, you know, it's always a goal the regulations, goal your comprehensive plan. The CN zone is really a neighborhood zone which you know isn't

shocking given its name, but more specifically it's meant for areas with two lane streets, not something like this section of East Main Street next I-95. But for a long time there wasn't really a more

appropriate zone. So this site has operated for 40 years. And every time something had to be done on the site, it was basically done through variants, you know, sign changes, you know, small sign

changes. It was a variance, which, you know, from a planning perspective isn't the best way to, you know, to manage a site. I think I've been an attorney for 12 years. I think I've done five

applications for this site that were all through variants. So as the staff report indicated, we had previously applied for a variance for this proposed site work. And during that process we actually

received a positive referral from the planning board for that. And just like we have with the current application. But the variance was ultimately denied 3-2. And after that I was talking with the

zoning department and we discussed that maybe it was time to get this site appropriately zoned. I spoke with Mr. Blessing. He conferred with his staff and indicated to me back in March that he felt

the CL zone was the appropriate zone for this property. And I think that tracks because if you look at the CL zone's purpose, it's to create attractive shopping and services accessible by all modes.

And, you know, this site being located on East Main Street, you know, can provide that level of access. The site is on a bus route. It's actually right at a bus stop on East Main. And then also just

its proximity to I-95. And for that reason, I think it's clear that the CL is more appropriate than the CN, giving that that's a neighborhood zone. And it's not just from a youth perspective, but

again, particularly when you look at East Main Street. And we have the obvious added benefit, though, that drive-throughs are permitted in the CL District, which will allow this, I think, this site to

function, you know, better and properly and along with your planning goals in the future. All dimensional standards are met under the CL. This was submitted. I know there was a text change to the CL

regarding minimum lot area. This was submitted prior to that. But, you know, with regards to your setbacks regarding coverage... -Kenny Russo? -Yes. Excuse me. When was it submitted? It was submitted

in the beginning of April, was for submission. Do you have some evidence of submission that would show the date? The original submission... I mean, do you get a stamped copy? How does that work? I

have signed up a narrative, which you can see was dated April 9, 2026. So I had the signed date when we had it. Right. I was just asking about submission. I'll have to look for if there was one that

had a stamp on it. It did go through a long process, you know, going through the planning board. But again, you know, this was something I... I'm sorry. Going back for a second. Did I see your cover

letter there with the application? The narrative? Yes. Yeah. That was originally written in January 13th. -Oh, okay. -Yeah. Actually, originally I had considered the CI zone as a possibility as well.

And then through conversations with Mr. Blessing, it was... The email I actually looked at today, it was his opinion that the CL District would be more appropriate for this site. And we met the

standards, you know. And, you know, even with things regarding coverage, setback, we met the standards for that. So it seemed beyond just the use itself. Sure. And, you know, obviously, you know, as

was read, we presented it to the planning board, and they agreed as well with positive referral for the zone change aspect of it. So, again, I think, you know, just with regards to the zone change,

it's looking to finally place this site in, I think, a proper zone. This isn't a neighborhood zone, you know. East Main Street has obviously got, you know, significant more traffic than your typical

Tulane Street. And this is, I think, an appropriate designation for this site. So, moving on to the proposal for the development. So this is a survey that shows the current layout, the drive-through,

you know, as we just discussed, preexisting nonconforming use in the CN. And the site has developed over the years through the receipt of variances. You can see the buildings in the center a lot with

the front facing East Main Street. And then you can see around the building is the single lane drive-through with an order point here in this top left corner of the building and then the pickup window

down at the bottom in the rear of the building. There's two access points. There's East Main Street, which has a right in driveway and a right out driveway up here in the northeast corner. And then

Blatchley Road, which has a full movement driveway in the southwest corner. The current site features 61... I'm sorry, just put your cursor where the Blatchley Road ingress and egress cocaine. Right

there. And then East Main Street up here in the top corner. This right here is a right only out and this is a right only in. So, in total, the parking area, 61 parking spaces, and the restaurant has

90 seats. The drive-through holds about 11 cars in its queue. And then you have a little bit over... If you get to like 15, 16, you start to block the parking area because it would extend back out

towards this direction. And then it's about 17 vehicles before it starts backing out onto East Main Street. So, that's a condition that we are looking to address as this McDonald's business is really

transformed to more of a drive-through business. So, to get to the site plan, so the main portion of the proposal is for the addition of a second side-by-side drive-through lane with what's called

springboard canopy, which is just that. It's like an upside down L that shows you the height that you need to be able to go through the drive-through. A pre-browse menu board and a digital menu board

as well. This would increase the number of drive-through queue spaces from 11 to 23 spaces. Luckily, we have had another McDonald's that went through that same change in queue spaces from 11 to 23.

And our traffic experts have data from the results of that change. They went from a single lane drive-through to a side-by-side like we're proposing. And we think the results of that change is really

indicative of what we expect from this site. So, I will have them go through that a little later. One of the reasons McDonald's is so successful is that they are experts at efficiency in the

restaurants. They design their kitchen, analyzing the number of steps their employees have to take, and will make modifications to reduce it. They go to that level, and the same goes for their drive-

throughs. And one of the biggest delays in drive-through lanes, if it's a single lane drive-through, is someone getting stuck at the ordering window. The person doesn't know their order. They have

kids screaming and won't tell their parents the order. And when that happens and you have a single lane drive-through, it creates a log jam. The second drive-through lane allows the queue to continue

moving when there's somebody who's a slow order and is taking up the main lane. So, it's really a significant improvement to the flow of their drive-through. Another big improvement is the digital

menu board. It shows you, and some of you, if you've been to McDonald's, you may have seen these boards, but it shows you your order. And that allows mistakes to be corrected right there, rather than

at the pickup window. Because McDonald's drive-through is designed so that you order, you go to the pickup window and pay, or if you're already prepaid now, you can do that, and your order's ready to

go. So, if you get to the pickup window and there's a mistake made in your order that needs to be corrected, it can really slow things down and disrupt the flow of the operation. So, having the

digital menu board shows you the order, clears up confusion, and allows the mistake to be corrected immediately. And then you proceed to the pickup window and everything is supposed to happen on time.

So, when you get there, the order's ready and you can go. So, that menu board is actually important in improving the efficiency of these drive-throughs. Even the pre-browse menu, this is something

that they've looked at, it's a small menu that lets you know some of the specials and some of the most popular deals. And that gives people an idea for an order even before they get to the menu board,

so they're prepared to make the order quickly. You know, it's all designed to have this drive-through operate as efficiently as possible. And, you know, that's obviously, you know, kind of the main

driver of this to clear up this issue where this drive-through lane gets backed up and sometimes out onto East Main Street. The other part of the change to the site plan is really having the parking

area meet the demand of the use. So, the proposal is to reduce the parking area from 61 to 33 spaces, which is including two ADA spaces. Seats in the restaurant are slightly being reduced by three.

But, you know, this site is currently way over parked. At the reduced, 33 spaces will still be compliant with the regulations. But we also did analysis of our parking area and aligned with the

requirements of the zoning regulations. And again, our parking area, as we've observed, would be able to meet our parking demand. We had originally submitted a plan with 37 spaces. When we went and

met with the planning board, there were some spaces that were up here on the northern side that they asked us to eliminate. And so in this version, there was a revised version, we've eliminated those

spaces. And so now it's showing as proposed 33, which is, you know, still compliant with the regulations. Another thing I'll just also note, and I learned this discussion with our traffic engineers,

is that when the efficiency of a drive-through improves, we expect our demand to drop for parking to drop further. You know, if a drive-through isn't working efficiently, a customer will decide, okay,

you know, I'm just going to go park my car and go in. But if it's working properly, which we anticipate will happen with this change, then people are more likely to just continue on in the drive-

through. So that'd further reduce our parking demand. Another improvement that might get overlooked, but we worked with a lot actually with staff and the planning board on this, which is the

installation of a straight and raised pedestrian walkway from East Main Street's public sidewalk that's directly to our front door. These are ADA compliant sidewalks. There's no such crosswalk now.

And this site is, as I said earlier, right at a bus stop. So we do have some pedestrian customers. Originally, the walkway was angled. We received comments asking us to straighten it, which we did. We

were asked, as I just mentioned, to remove parking spaces by the planning board. We did that. And then we were asked to make it a raised crosswalk, which we made that revision as well. We've also made

traffic control improvements, I should say, at the East Main driveway. And those are because I know this was a source of some of the comments that were received from staff. So we expanded the size of

this island that you see. It's currently about half this size. And so we expanded out to expand out the angle of it to really make it difficult if somebody's taking a left turn in or trying to take a

left turn into the site from East Main Street. And then also if someone is trying to exit and take a left turn out onto East Main Street. So we've expanded that and increased the angle of that so to

deter folks from doing that. The other is adding in. I'm sorry, on that point, what's the width of the drive lane there at the island? So this is, you're talking chair, you're talking right from the

island to the curb. So you can see right there, no, it's 12 feet coming in and 12 feet going out. Okay, but it's up at the street. It's wider, right? Instead of going at an angle, if you were to go

parallel to the street from the island. Yeah, I would assume that's longer. I don't have that measurement. We might, somebody on the call, our engineer might be able to get that specific measurement,

but it gets down here to 12 feet. And what we've added here, Chair, that you can see is these tubular delineators. Maybe you've seen these around, they're poles, they're plastic, but to deter somebody

from driving over the island to access the site. So really making it very difficult with the increased angle and these delineators for somebody to take a left turn into the site. Well, that's what, I

mean, if it's 20 feet wide up at its widest point there, it doesn't seem like it would be all that difficult to make a left turn in there. But we'll get to that. Yeah, and I can certainly have,

because I didn't do the site design on that, so we can have our focus upon it and speak to that. We do have to, this is a state road, so I mean, I know we're cognizant of DOT and what they might

permit. And we tried to add every measure we could think of to try to prevent somebody from taking a legal turn. We've added signage to tell folks that are going here. One, we have these pavement

markings, but on top of that have signage telling folks that it's right turn only and there's no left turn. And we did add, it's sometimes a little tough to see because with so much on the site plan,

but we added a lot of pavement markings to this plan to make sure it was clear to everyone, you know, how to get around this site. You can see here, the addition of do not enter to make sure somebody

coming up largely doesn't try to go the wrong way. And just these drive through arrows that are directing people to where they need to go to, to get into the drive through lane. Yeah, ask a question

at this point. Yeah, Mr. Russo was every thought given to stationing a security guard there during peak hours to prevent this from happening. And at East Main Street. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, you

Commissioner, it's something I haven't seen at other fast food restaurants to have somebody out there you know I mean they're open, you know, every day in the week. 365 days in a high peak area I'm

talking about 24 hours a day when the issues occur. I mean it sounds like a reasonable solution to me, because what you've done so proposing here, I don't think it's going to work. Well, it's

certainly what's right bill what part won't work factor preventing people from turning go after heading west on East Main Street prevent them from making a left hand turn into McDonald's. Yeah, this,

I don't see this topic. Yeah, I, I share that concern and I'd like to see the applicant come up with some more ideas. I mean, no, no, no, no worries because you know it is one of the main issues and

that we've sought to address and and trust me we have looked at all different ways that we can address this we've looked at other sites, and what we've done on other sites, and, and, and this was a

compilation of measures that we, you know, certainly think will help address that issue, you know, which is, I mean, one of the main issues, you know, particularly in talking with our traffic

engineers with the site is the backing up. You know out onto East Main Street, and and relieving that and fixing that issue is, is, you know, what they feel from a traffic safety point of view is the

main one, and so, and I think we would, we would agree that that is important. Yeah, yeah, and into that chair, I think I'll turn this over to our traffic consultant because we did a lot of analysis.

We looked at other sites that went through this change I mean I've been doing, I work. I've worked on it's probably a dozen McDonald's restaurants through Connecticut, and we've been doing this side

by side improvement across almost all of them. So, we do have some data analyzing what happens with this change in in going from a side by side. So I think Paul's on. Yeah, can you hear me. Yes. Good

evening, Chairman and board members. So, yes, thank you. And the last name is spelled g o ing just like the word going. We prepared a traffic report. It's a letter report. And basically, we looked at

a few, a few things we looked at the drive through operation. We looked at the parking operation and we looked at crash history. So, in terms of the existing drive through I think Chris gave a very

detailed explanation of what's existing and what's proposed, but just to reiterate in the existing condition, we can accommodate about 11 vehicles in the drive through queue community up to 14 before

it starts to queue back out onto East Main Street in the proposed condition, we would increase that on site 11 vehicles to 23 vehicles, we, we know anecdotally that that does that the drive through

gets back out on to East Main Street but we observed ourselves as well we observed the drive through queuing on February 5 of 2026 which was a Thursday, and then on February 7 which was the following

Saturday, and during the breakfast period, we saw a maximum of 10 vehicles in queue. During lunch we saw maximum of 14 during dinner, this and these are all weekday. We during dinner we saw a maximum

of 18 vehicles queued up, and we saw the queue extend back out four times. And on the Saturday we saw maximum queue 15 vehicles, and we saw that that queue back up to the highway, two times. So,

that's definitely a situation that we that we want to address in terms of these other sites that that Chris mentioned one is in Norwalk and Brantford, and these are both locations that we previously

have worked on before they had gone from one lane drive through to side by side, or double drive through the Norwalk site is very similar to the Stanford site. I'm sorry, the Brantford site is similar

to the Stanford site in that it's going from a capacity of 11 cars in queue to 23 cars in queue. And you can see on the on your screen, the what we observed in 2022 prior to the side by side being

implemented where we had, we had the queues of 12 cars during lunch and on Saturday, 11 cars which was the capacity during the dinner hour and 10 cars during breakfast. After we did the improvements,

we saw actually a larger queue during the dinner hour of 17, but it was accommodated because we had increased that queue capacity to 23 vehicles. So that sort of suggests what Chris was mentioning,

which is that when, when the drive through operates very poorly. There's what we call unmet demand, people who would prefer to just go through the drive through, but it's backed up, so they park

instead and go into the restaurant. So now we're accommodating that unmet demand there. Similarly at the Norwalk site, not a significant increase in capacity but increasing the drive through queue

from 14 to 17 vehicles, and we did see the queue getting close to that 14 capacity during dinner and lunch, Saturday lunch, and then after the improvements were constructed. We saw larger queues being

accommodated within within that 17 vehicles, you know, so we believe that this improvement proposed with the two drive through lanes in at the Stanford location would address the queuing issue would

help I can't really say to what degree, like numerically, but, you know, qualitatively help the the parking and help the operate the site operate more safely. The, the issue with the parking. We are

reducing the parking. We're meeting the requirement 33 vehicles. We saw a maximum of 32 vehicles part when we did our study, which again was in February. We saw 16 vehicles parked for the weekday

breakfast period 27 for weekday lunch 26 during weekday dinner, and then 32 during Saturday lunch. The 33 meets the requirement, we reduced the number of stalls a little bit to accommodate the request

for additional landscaping that the planning board had made. But we, we believe that the 33 vehicles are sufficient for the, for the project. In terms, in terms of our good. Go ahead. No, no, I just,

I thought you were done. I can go on forever. But I won't. Just crashes. We did, we did know seven crashes that involved left turns at the driveway, what we, what we also found when, when we went out

there was there. We didn't have the signs in place, no left turn signs to convey to the traveling public that they can't make a left turn. So certainly that's something that this project would would

correct. And so we would have no left turn signs on the site, as, as well as on the highway. So westbound drivers would see those signs and know that that that turn can't be made there in terms of

modifying the driveway in a way to make the left turn more difficult. We've, we're trying to increase the size of that island to only allow a 12 foot lane, which we're turning vehicles pretty minimal

there, it's, it's difficult to design a driveway to be completely impossible for somebody who's creative and not law abiding to, to make a left turn where they're not supposed to. But I believe that

with the, with the vertical delineators which will have, you know, reflective tape on them, and will be apparent whether, regardless of the weather conditions. That that, that modification to the

driveway will will certainly emphasize the fact that you are not to turn left there, both for entering an exit. I'm sorry, the vertical delineators are the poles on the island. Yes, yes. Well, so they

tell you you're not supposed to drive on the island which probably is pretty extreme. But it doesn't tell you you're not supposed to turn left. How does that understand how those vertical delineators

affect left turn. I guess you're correct. It just in combination with the no left turn signs. The vertical delineators show somebody who, whether it's snowing or raining, you know, if they don't

notice the island itself, they'll see the reflective stripes and the vertical delineators will call attention to themselves. I think that's a good idea. So people don't get it accident. Okay, I have a

question on the vertical delineators or those on the island itself or those on the road after the island. They're on the island itself. And so, once that island so called ends, it's possible to make

the left turn there into the driveway. Do you have a picture or a diagram of this, Chris you were sharing the plan. It's it's right here. So, Commissioner the this is this is the island I'll try to

draw it hopefully draws it well. But that's the island right there. Right. And then these are the those black dots are the tubular delineator so we're showing two on each side. Okay, you know, again,

we have the island but this is a visual marker to that that shows people from a distance or you know as Paul was saying, an inclement weather, you know, it shows where it is. But yeah, it's it's on

the island. It's not it's not in the drive aisle. And so the driveway itself is to the media and left about island is that right. Yeah, so this is the this is the turn in. And then this is the

turnout. And we've, we've, we restricted the size of this as much as we can. So, between the island and the width of the driveway and the angle of it, you, you, if you were trying to take this left.

You would you would have to essentially do an S turn to try to get in here. It would just be very difficult because you'd have to, you'd have to come out and then to be able to meet the angle to get

in here is it's, you know, it's not as simple as coming straight down and driving over this, driving over this island. Yeah, except if you start the left a little bit later, it's basically a straight

line in. You have to come back like you'd have to come back to be able to get to the angle that we've now created with this to avoid getting these curves here. Yeah. Is there any sign up in the island

that says no left? Um, I don't know if I mean, if it's something we could provide, I think we do. We could also possibly provide a sign on this side as well, to just tell people no left. Yeah, and I

just want to point out that the two signs that are labeled AD, those are in the road. They should be, you know, behind the curb line on the westbound side. Right. They should be backed up towards the

top. They should be backed up, yeah. Yeah. They should be up here on this side. Okay. Go ahead, Vanita. Go ahead, Vanita. I have a question about the island itself. What's the height of the curb? And

could that be increased to make it more of a deterrent? I'd have to, yeah, if Tariq or someone from the state is on, they could come on and know what the exact height of that curb is. Let me see if I

can... Vanita, is he on as a panelist? Let me check, I tried to put him on earlier, okay, I think Daniel Caputo. Oh, Daniel Caputo, yes, he's also with Cor State, yep. I can also scroll for the plans

and see if I can find that detail. There we go. Hello, everybody. Dan Caputo here, Cor State's group, typically the curbs, we have them as a six inch reveal. Okay. Would a taller curb be permitted?

Would that be in addition to deterrent? I mean, I think that would be up to the city to kind of justify that, whether you think a higher curb would work as a deterrent for that left turn. We can

design it to be higher. That's not the issue. It's whether or not it would be accepted as that solution. It's probably something that the DOT would have to sign off on, state DOT. Vanita, you had, I

think, mentioned something earlier about wanting to see what it will look like. Can you just explain that? Yeah. So I was thinking a street view with the proposed island and the signage that might be

helpful to visualize what the experience might be for a driver driving to the west and see if it really blocks the view of the entrance. So when they're driving, they really see the island and not the

entrance as much so it makes it harder. So that might be helpful for the board to visualize if it's a realistic left turn or it really becomes not a feasible turn. So in effect, it would be a

rendering that they would be providing? I would think photographs with those islands marked over it in some way, if that's possible and the signage added, so marked up street view is what I was

thinking. Attorney Russo, can that be provided to the board? You could certainly look at it and see if it's something that we could provide and show how it would look. Yeah, that's something we could

look at. We would like to see that. And then I know Attorney Rizio, who's worked on this site for a long time and has some of the history of this, wanted to also add some more. Well, I'm sorry, before

we get to Attorney Rizio, is there anyone who has any questions for the traffic engineer? Anyone else? I just had a quick question. You put up some stuff about comparison on other sites from 2022. And

I was just wondering, they seem like kind of really random, like what's the thought process behind that? I understand you're trying to show us numbers to convince us of why this makes sense, but so,

you mean, why were you on data? Well, like, for example, if you read more in the report, which I had done, it says, Observed Wednesday, August 24th, 2022, it says, if you keep going, it says August

20th, and there's another one on July 13th, 2022. And there's another one on July 16th, 2022. I was just trying to understand. Sure. I can explain. So we work on lots of McDonald's in Connecticut, New

York, New Jersey. And the Brantford and Norwalk sites are just two McDonald's that we happen to work on, where we did cuing observations before a side-by-side drive-through was implemented. And then

we were able to go back and count it again. So I've worked on over 100 McDonald's. I've been doing McDonald's work for 20 years. And we don't know all the data that we should be collecting for future

projects. So it's just happenstance that we had those two pieces of data that were somewhat local available. I guess my question is, why isn't it like for this month in this time period, this is what

it averaged versus here in Stanford, this is what it averages? There's no one out there collecting that information unless we go out and put equipment there to collect that information for a short

period of time. And then we get that data back and prepare tables for it. I don't want to keep everyone's time. So what you're just saying is you do it on this particular date and then you use it

moving forward. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And Commissioner, I could just add to that too. The Brantford location provided us an example where it was the same change in the queue space. It was 7-23. So we

thought that that was a good site to choose. And then Norwalk gave us one something nearby, but also a city, even though the capacity change there was not as significant, it only went from 14 to 17,

but it did go from a single lane to a side by side. So that allowed us that type of example for this. So I know that played into choosing these locations as well. Yeah, Chris. And I think we also

submitted a letter, I believe, from the police commissioner and Yonkers who the same change went from a single drive, they were experiencing the same problem Stanford was experiencing, cars queuing

out onto the street, very much frustration with an old pre-existing nonconforming lot. And they went to the double drive through there and the head of the chief of police has issued a letter that

basically said that once they did the double drive through it basically took care of all of their traffic congestion problems. And we're doing what we can, the Trev's family's owned this site since

the '80s. They are now in their second generation of ownership with a third generation coming in soon. They want to do all they can to operate this in a safe, efficient manner. They don't anticipate

any growth and neither does McDonald's. McDonald's always worries about safety, corporate image, all of that providing a safe area for people to come to and they don't anticipate their growth growing

at all. What they do anticipate is much more effective and much more satisfied customers which will make this thing really work. And the traffic problems don't help them at all. One of the things that

Chairman, I noticed that you had a concern with and I'm going to ask both the engineer and the traffic engineer, is how severe can we make that entryway? We noticed the 12 feet at the minimum but

where you come in on the street, I think Chairman you seem to think, and Chris I think we talked about it, we didn't have the number, that it was wider. And to what extent how severe can we make that

turn in, in other words so that it's maybe 12 feet at the street line and make it so that somebody has to make it, you know, as an illegal turn as they can make, almost a complete U-turn to get into

our law. Because I think that's Chairman, what you were mentioning, you were concerned about it is 12 feet at one point at a narrow part but at where the entry is to the curb cut, how narrow can we

make that to make that as severe a turn as it can be for somebody trying to make a left-hand turn? Would that be fair Chairman, what you're looking at? Yes, that is. So Paul or Dan, if you could

address that. Sorry, go on Paul. I think what we would have to do is if you see where the 25 foot radius is labeled between the A and the F markers, we would need to increase that radius. So am I able

to draw on this? I don't know Paul, you might have to be the one sharing it to be able to draw on it. If you tell me, I'll do my best to interpret it. So we could make the driveway a little narrower

possibly. We would have to run some vehicle turns using software. But to make the driveway more restrictive, I think we need to widen at the curb line and then, hold on a second, let me see if I can

do something. I think the goal that the Commission seems to be struggling with is to make it as difficult as you can so that it's not a left turn and it becomes closer to a U turn. Yeah, to increase

the angle. I'm going to try to share my screen too. I'll stop sharing. So can you see my screen? Not yet. Not yet. How about now? Yes. Yes. So really, what I think we would want to do is kind of cut

this back here, widen this out over here with the goal of kind of making this dimension this way between that nose and this nose to minimize that dimension. Does that make sense? Yes, it is. Yeah. And

the question is, how far can you extend the island west there to the left? Can you make it just 12 feet? Can you extend the island so that the opening is just 12 feet wide? Well, we need the width to

be 12 feet or something close to that, you know, 11 feet may work. No, no, it's narrows to 12 feet, but it looks wider than that at the street line. Can you narrow the street line opening to just 12

feet by extending the island to the left? Possibly, but right here, this is a two foot radius already. It's not easy or effective to construct. Could the island be pushed out further into the street?

Yeah, basically to meet the same street, the same as the street line is. The island seems to be set back a little bit off. If you push that out, you could probably extend your, to be at equal with the

curb cut. We would have to check with, we would have to check with the DOT that typically this dimension here from the, from the curb line, like the linear edge of, edge of curb or the gutter to the

island, typically you want that to be three feet. In some cases, you know, two feet could be acceptable. We wouldn't want it. We wouldn't want to put it right up against, well, we wouldn't want to put

it right up against that curb line because, that would be a danger for plowing operations. You know, it's just, it's too close and the plow would get caught on it. You see what I'm saying? But we can

certainly put it as close. I didn't get an answer to whether we can reduce the opening there to 12 feet at the curb line. I think what you're asking is if we can keep this at 12 feet that whole way,

to do that way, to put in a very small radius there. Yeah. And be like concave. Or just extend the middle. I mean, just extend the width of that island so that it, well, no, I guess it's, you can't

close up the 12 foot part there. Yeah, so it has to go farther on the top of the island, farther to the left. Yeah, Chair. I think it's safe to say that we're happy to, as much as DOT will allow us to

make improvements to deter people from taking that left-hand turn, that our client is willing to do that. We don't have an issue with that. Why don't you look at it and come back with a new plan or

revised plan if you can do that, and assuming it's not a DOT issue. The other quick question I just answered real quickly is a discussion about a security guard. And short of having a policeman stand

in the middle of the road in direct traffic, I don't see how anybody is going to, without enforcement potential, has the right, you probably create more of a mess and more of a conflict at the curb

line with somebody trying to come in and some security guard telling him he can't. The only people that they're going to ever obey, and frankly, they don't, people don't do the best at doing that, is

seeing a policeman in the center of the road directing traffic. But we'll do all we can to make this as severe as possible. And basically, you're not worried about a left-hand turn, but it's going to

be more of a U-turn that we're going to try and make it. Are we also worried about a left turn out of the lot? Yes. Same issue. So I guess we want you to look at extending the island to the right to

make it tougher for someone to make a left turn. We'll definitely make this as difficult as we possibly can and have the radiuses work so that people can also get in and out. But we understand your

concern, and we'll make it as difficult as we can. Or are there other things that anyone would like to talk about or see there when it comes to this left turn? Any other measures? No, Mr. Chairman,

I'd like to see what they come back with. OK, OK, Tony Russo, what's next? Well, if we're coming back, I think we could probably hold it there. Attorney Rizzio touched on the police chief letter

again. You know, they had the exact same issue. It was on South Broadway, which is one of their major thoroughfares. He noted that, and it was backing up, and it was causing those issues on South

Broadway. And I wish I had a letter like this for every application I did to have from a commanding officer telling that this design alleviated traffic congestion and that he highly recommends the new

design. I think that's just about as good as it gets for a land use attorney. That location was very close to a hospital, like right across the street from a hospital. So it was a very busy location,

and the police were very familiar with coming in and out of that area. Did you guys do anything to respond to the comment from the planning board about landscaping? Yeah, we added the landscaping. I

handle the planning commission. We added the landscaping. When we moved those parking spaces, there used to be parallel spaces that were proposed, and all that landscaping was not previously

landscaping, along East Main Street. So there was also some landscaping that we added, Chris, I think up in the area up front. There's some here, and then I believe over here as well. And the other

thing, it doesn't show on this specific plan, but was the raised crosswalk before we just had it flush with the driveway, but now it's almost like a speed cable that sits above. Did you add

landscaping just above the big circle? There's a small area, it looks like landscaping. Is that landscaping? Yeah, that one. So right here, yeah, I believe there's, I think it might just be grass, but

yeah, there was some addition here. This was definitely the big, because this was where the three spaces were, that was the biggest adder. Okay. What's your, for the traffic engineer, you mentioned

that the project's not expected to generate new traffic. What's the basis for that statement? Sure. So traffic engineers generally use a publication of the Institute for Transportation Engineers, or

the ITE, that's called trip generation. So in trip generation, the amount of traffic generated by a fast food restaurant with drive-thru is based on the floor area of the restaurant. So in this case

where the floor area is not being changed, there's no calculated increase in traffic. Does anyone have any other questions? Okay. Ben, why don't we-- Before we do that, are you aware of the email that

was sent out tonight regarding the submission date for this application? I'm sorry, say that again, Bill. Are you aware of the email that was sent out tonight after seven o'clock regarding the

submission date for this particular application? We'll also get out of the open now. Yeah, I didn't see that. I'm sure you can have Vanita comment on it, but it appears that we have-- So the, you

know, because this application was filed in close proximity to our zoning text being amended for this district, there's a question of whether the new regulations apply to this application or was this

filed before. So looking at the filing date, the application was filed on April 24th, but the zoning regulations became effective on April 13th. So this application came in after the regulations were

effective. So that the new regulations would apply to this? Yeah. Yeah. I know this was just dropped on you, but we would like a response to that, if not now, the next week. Sure. I mean, you know, in

your legislative discretion, I think you have the ability to zone properties even if they are not for me. Again, you know, this is-- I'm looking at an email from March 12th that was sent to us that

said after review of both the CI and the CL, we decided that the CL would be the better fit from the Landry's department. And so, you know, we amended our application, we proceeded-- The new

regulations did not take an effect then, right? I'm not sure it's the exact date of when they had taken effect, but-- April 13th. April 13th. Yeah. It hadn't as of then. But again, you know, it was up

on the recommendation, you know, and we proceeded accordingly. That would be pretty-- I mean, we're-- We're taking the advice of the zoning staff and filing for this and I would certainly think at

that point they knew that the regulations were being changed. This would not have been a surprise to them. And frankly, you know, we've been dealing with a nonconformity for 30 years. Everything is to

means to be done through variance. This is really the appropriate zone for the site as the Planning Commission saw also. And I mean, we did what staff asked us to do and they had to know if it was

available on March 13th, that the regulations were going to change and maybe you should consider another zone. That was not what we were advised of. And Chairman, I'll just also know, and I know I

said this earlier, but as far as setbacks go in coverage and standards about the site development, I believe this application is conforming. You know, there's no variances required for any of the work

that is being done. So why did you go to the zoning board of appeals? Well, that was prior to us even applying for the zone change. That was last year, you know, and again, that was-- Well, they grant

variances and if there were none required, what was the-- But that-- No, under the new zone, there would be no-- we meet except for land size. We meet all the requirements and every respect. Gotcha.

And you know, we're trying to make this work, believe me. Like I said, I've represented the Trev's for a lot of years. They run probably the best run-- one of the best run operations of McDonald's

throughout the state of Connecticut. We're not going to go anywhere. We're trying to alleviate a problem. We believe this by getting this zone change, doing the internal-- I mean, they're not going to

go anywhere, but what we can do is make this safer for everybody and make it safer for people to operate, make it better for the people on the street, do what we can to make it severe so that the

people who decide they're not going to follow the rules, follow the rules as far as these nasty left-hand turns that they're not supposed to be taking that could cause an accident. But the McDonald's

is going to be there, I would hope, for another 40 years. And we have an opportunity now to solve a problem together and that's what we're trying to do. And with staff, this looked to be the best

roadway for all of us to solve this problem. It's not just our problem. It's everybody's, and we're doing what we can to make this better. And I just want to clarify, we recommended the CL because the

CI actually does not allow for drive-through, also not by special permit. But you also knew at that point that the CL was being changed, correct? I would have to look up where we were in this process.

It was basically on the meeting, it would have been effective two weeks before, three weeks before. We don't need to get into, I'm not trying to blame or look in anyone's favor. We're trying to make

this better. They have been great citizens in Stanford. They have done whatever they can, the Trev's have done whatever they can to run us very successful, clean operation. And we're just, we're

hoping together with you to solve this problem. This is, like I said, it's not just our problem and it's not going away. The McDonald's is not going to pack up and go look for a bigger piece of

property. They're going to be there. They're going to stay there. The question becomes, how do we all get along and get this thing to the point where it doesn't, we don't have cars backing out on the

East Main Street and we're doing the best we can to do that. I can assure you. Yeah, I think you'd have members of this board who would agree that this is a better plan than what they currently got. I

think the issue we're going to be faced with is you've come in under a new rig after it took effect and how do we handle that? Why don't you, if you don't, can you just, for next meeting or whenever

you want to do it, just give us a, um, a memo on why you think the new rig shouldn't apply both. It's a two part question. One deals with the, um, comprehensive plan category and the other with the,

uh, size. Well, we'll, we'll, we'll brief that before we'll give you, we'll, we'll certainly address that to the commission. I appreciate your patience folks. Look, this has been a long time for all

of us. I've been having four of these boards in Stanford for 20 years on this site. And we're just trying to try and try to make it the best we can. Yeah. No, I think we, we understand that, um, which

is why we were looking at things like the left turn issue. Um, okay. Can we go to the public now? Um, if there's anyone from the public who wishes to speak on this, um, please raise your hand and, uh,

when you're called on, just identify yourself and give us your address, please. First we have Mr. Dave Adams. Dave, you're on, or you were on. He seemed to have dropped off. He's not in the attendee

list right now. Okay. I don't have any other. Anyone else? No. Monica 12. Okay. Mr. 12, can you unmute yourself? Good evening. My name is Monica 12 and I live on 37 Hanrahan in Stanford. Um, uh, when

my children were younger, they often, uh, we often went to McDonald's. Their grandfather always took them there. And that was a very special place for my father and his buddies who always often met

there for, for coffee, as they would say. And they would have a group of their senior citizen friends from our church who would gather there. They were very memorable and my, my children remember. So

if you could kindly tell your, the owners that, uh, this Stanford location is, is, is special in McDonald's now that they've grown, we don't go there as often, but, um, their childhood memories do

contain that. Um, the other thing is, uh, what is the crash accident history for East Main Street location? I would like to know. Uh, the other thing is, um, it, uh, my concern is for delivery trucks,

tow trucks, uh, many service trucks use McDonald's during off peak hours to get their quick lunch, a snack, uh, many things. Cause that, I remember going there at lunchtime, it was busy. And then

after that crowd went away, there would be, uh, these service trucks coming in and they would park. So that eliminates, uh, that makes it hard for these people in, in these larger trucks to come in

and get their lunch. Um, so the entrance and exit seems to be, you said quite severely curtailed, uh, for, for these bigger tow trucks and delivery trucks that deliver like little devs or anyone,

anything like that, uh, that's bigger than a vehicle. So you're discriminating against that, I think, um, imposed by this town, uh, not on your own, not on your own. Uh, let me see, what else did I

ask? Um, uh, will, is this a digital, digital order, the, the new systems that you're proposing? Will they be people lists? Uh, that's a question. How many, how many jobs will be reduced because of

the, uh, double driveway? Um, I'm not too fond of the idea because of your reducing the, uh, the, uh, the, the, the, um, the space of parkings and, but inside you're not. So that, that, that's

questionable. Uh, Mr. Attorney Russo had spoken that he'd like to change the zone. I really don't think changing the zone is proper, Mr. Russo, because, um, this is a neighborhood. If you look, you

know, we're not based on I-95 and the post road. We are a family Stanford unit that, uh, that really, that is a family, uh, what is that Cortland Avenue, which has all residential. And then there's

all the little houses, three minutes. Okay. Well, I've said my, I've said my time just, uh, those are some of the things. Okay. Thank you. Um, Mr. Adams has joined again. Mr. Adams, can you unmute?

Uh, am I unmuted? Yes. Okay, excellent. So sorry about the, uh, previous hiccup, uh, running a new, a new computer, uh, and couldn't get the microphone to work. Hello, uh, zoning board names, Dave

Adams, friendly neighbor, Dave Adams. Uh, I did want to comment on a couple of things on this application, my, um, yeah, I'm sorry. Uh, I'm a Glenbrook road resident. Uh, I'm in Glenbrook and, um, uh,

first of all, I want to say that I'm very familiar with this particular establishment. I do not frequent this establishment, but I've passed it many a time and I have seen, uh, a lot of the things

that have been described during this meeting in terms of hazardous conditions in terms of, uh, you know, cars backing out onto the road, backing up onto the road. Um, I personally think that this

proposal to increase the, uh, drive through capacity is absolutely a great idea. And it certainly, uh, I think it's going to have the desired effect, which is to, um, you know, uh, eliminate some of

that backup that goes out on the road. However, I need to, uh, I just like miss twall, I've got some consider, uh, concerns about this, uh, no left turn, uh, deterrence model. Um, whenever you hear

the word, uh, you know, deterrence, you should immediately think to yourself make incredibly more dangerous. And while you may, you may reduce the number of people that will attempt a left turn as, as

Mr. Morris had spoke, said before, where there is a will, there is a way. And when you create these deterrence factors, you are instead of, you may be reducing the number of people to try it, but you

are almost, uh, you know, exponentially increasing the, the likelihood of a collision. So and as miss twall had, had spoken about logistics, traffic is still going to need access to this parking lot

logistics for McDonald's logistics for, you know, uh, you know, in general, uh, you know, larger vehicles, fire engine access, uh, you know, ambulance, ambulatory access. When you, when you are

narrowing things, you hear the words traffic calming, it is making things incredibly more dangerous. It is not making things safer. And I realized that, you know, uh, you know, uh, governmentally and,

and in the traffic study world and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, uh, it, it, we've gone down this road where we've entered a delusion that somehow making things more dangerous is going to make things

safer. It's not. So I would highly advise you to completely scrap the idea of, uh, of trying to, uh, you know, disincentivize people from making that left turn and instead, uh, figure out a way to

make making a left turn more, uh, a more safe endeavor. Uh, that's what should be doing, uh, getting done here as far as the parking, uh, cutting don't care. Uh, I think that they're right. Uh, but I

think of something that was said before, uh, that, uh, you know, no calculated increase of traffic, uh, what was, was foreseen, but there's obviously a larger capacity for business. So if there's a

larger capacity for business, then the traffic generation is absolutely going to go up. The metric that the, uh, traffic engineer, and I'm not trying to, uh, you know, denigrate him at all. Uh, but

the calculation that the traffic engineer is using to determine, uh, an increase in traffic, it has no basis on actual, you know, uh, rates of, of commerce or the, the, the rate of traffic it's based

off square footage and it has, it is, it doesn't have any reality or any, uh, relationship with reality. So, um, I think that those are things that should be considered in this application. I think

that you should find your way through this application and eventually approve it because I think it's a, it would be a major improvement to that site and to East Main Street. And those are my

comments. And I hope you all have a wonderful evening and thank you very much for your time and your service. Thank you. I don't have any other public speakers. Okay. Um, Ralph, you want to go first

and then the applicant can respond or if there's anything that, uh, you want to respond to? Um, I don't have anything to, uh, respond to at this point. Okay. Then, um, Terny Russo, anything you would

like to say in response? Um, chair, uh, I think maybe it makes sense to hold until we, uh, you know, make this revision. Um, let's see what we can do, um, with regards to the site plan, um, you know,

just responding to two quick, quick comments, you know, the still would have employees that, you know, it's not, it's changing the digital menu board. Um, it's, it's not, not reducing the number of

employees at all. And then, um, Mr. Adams was talking about trucks and access we did submit. I didn't pull it up, but it's in the submission packet. There are truck turning plans to show, um, for two

trucks, uh, the, the McDonald's truck and the, the, um, refuse truck and those things, uh, she'd see eight and see nine that shows that we have proper movements, um, for those vehicles. Um, but on the

other thing, I think it makes sense that I'll just, you know, we'll come back with, um, what we're able to do and to show you, um, and, uh, revising this plan in, in presented at that time. Good. Um,

board, does anyone want to see anything else from the applicants? Anything else that they should be providing to us? Okay. No. No. Okay. Okay. Then, um, we will continue, uh, applications 226 dash 09

and 226 dash 10, um, until our next meeting, which takes place on October 26, 2026 at six 30 on zoom. And I, uh, thank the applicants for, uh, your time tonight. Thank you, chair. Thank you

commissioners for your comments. Thank you. Thanks. Okay. Next is application 226 dash 14, another, uh, zoning text change. The purpose of this text amendment is to align the CD district regulations

section 5e with the general structure of the regulations, establish separate rules for townhouse development in the CD designed commercial districts and additional design requirements and clarify the

review procedures. The text amendment also proposes to rename the district from the CD designed commercial district to CMC commercial and mixed use campus district, which more appropriately reflects

the character of the district. Others of the district will be updated throughout the regulation. No additional uses are proposed to be permitted. Also the geographic extent of these districts is not

proposed to be amended. Um, Roseanne, can you read the planning board letter, please? Certainly, uh, dated September 23rd, 2026 to Mr. David Stein chair, city of Stanford zoning board regarding CV

application two to six dash one for Stanford zoning board text change. Dear Mr. Stein and members of the zoning board during its meeting held on Tuesday, September 22nd, 2026, the planning board

reviewed the above captioned application referred in accordance with the requirements of the Stanford charter. The purpose of this text change is to align the CD district regulations with the general

structure of the regulations, establish separate rules for townhouse development in CD designed commercial districts, add additional design requirements and clarify the review procedures. The text

change also proposes to rename the district from CD designed commercial district to CMC commercial and mixed use campus district, which more appropriately reflect reflects the character of the

district. No additional uses are proposed to be permitted. So the geographic extent of these district is not proposed to be amended, rough busting land use bureau chief made a presentation and

answered questions from the board. After a brief discussion, the planning board unanimously recommended approval of CD application number two, two six dash one four and found this to be in general

harmony with the 2035 comprehensive plan. Sincerely, Stanford planning board, Jennifer, good, Zeno chair. Thank you. Ralph. You're on. Yes. Give me one second. Can you see my screen? Yes. Yep. Okay.

So, as was stated in the planning board letter, we are proposing some changes to the CD district regulations. I'm sure you're all quite familiar with the CD district. But just as a little refresher,

the CD districts were originally conceived as suburban office park districts. And unfortunately, with the decline in office use after the pandemic, a lot of them are vacant were vacant are in the

process of being redeveloped. So several years ago, now, residential uses were allowed in CD districts. They are mainly located along Longwood Road and Hybrid Road, as you can see here on the map. We

have this one outlier here, which is the Palmer Hill condo association. But generally, they are south of the Merritt along Longwood and High Ridge roads. As was stated in the planning board letter,

we're not proposing to extend the CD districts. This is only a text change, not a map change. And we're also not proposing to add any new uses that aren't already allowed in those districts. What we

are doing, however, is to add provisions for townhouse style development. What we've seen and what you've seen in recent years is that the only type of homeownership opportunities that have been

developed are townhouse style developments. And in many instances, when projects in CD districts came to you, you have also asked why certain developments were not townhouse developments and not for

homeownership use. So I think it's in the best interest of the city to also create homeownership opportunities and not just rental opportunities. So with those changes, we are trying to make townhouse

development more attractive. We also want to realign the section with the regulations in general. As you know, we've been going through all the districts and trying to clean them up, streamline them

and basically give them the general structure so that it's easier for users to understand the zoning regulations. Part of that is also renaming the district. It is not a commercial district primarily

anymore. In many instances, it is a mixed use or residential campus. So we want that to be reflected in the name. And we're also adding architectural and site design requirements. For example, when it

comes to the provision of internal walkways, the screening of mechanical equipment, et cetera. With regard to the nuts and bolts of the district, you see here a comparison between the current

regulations on the left of your screen and this salmon color, reddish color, and the proposed regulations on the right side in the greens. And what you will see is that actually not a whole lot is

changing. So the building coverage, for example, generally stays the same. We're actually reducing it for three-story development. The lot coverage is similar, we increase it for three-story

development because obviously three-story you need more space to accommodate the floor area if you can only go three stories up and also the building height is in the same vicinity as it is already in

the VC district. So the big difference really is the new column that you see all the way at the right for the townhouse development. So townhouses, as single family, home ownership opportunities, they

tend to be larger than apartments. So in order for developers to make townhouses more attractive, we believe it's necessary to increase both the building and the lot coverage and also increase the

permitted density slightly to what is currently allowed. However, because the residential density divider is also increasing, you don't get more units necessarily than if you develop it as an

apartment complex. We also proposing instead of a building height of four stories or 60 feet for commercial uses or three-story or 35 feet for three-story development to go a little bit higher to

three and a half stories or 45 feet because what we've seen in recent town home developments is that the garages are generally integrated in the building, which means that the buildings, even though

they only have three occupied stories, they tend to be a little bit higher in order to accommodate the garage within the building. With regard to the setbacks from the streets, we're not proposing any

changes. We're also not proposing any changes with regard to the setbacks from residential districts. I want to note that the 50 feet is generally much larger, a side yard setback than for a single

family district is required. I think we're providing adequate protection here for neighbours. In summary, it is really an attempt to make townhouse development more attractive. Once again, I think

there's an important policy and land use consideration since townhouse development seems to be one of the few areas where we actually see home ownership opportunities rather than rental development

and apartment building development. That's the reason why we're proposing to do this. Thank you for now. Good. Thank you, Ralph. Okay, let's go to the board for questions. Peter, let's start with you.

No, I think it looks great. I think it's a good idea, and I'm all for encouraging this sort of development. I don't have any questions. Sure, I have a question. In the proposed amendment, it says

townhouse, townhome development, little t, little d, and then in the chart it says big t, big t, big d. My question is, is townhome development defined in our regs? It should be defined. I mean,

basically, townhome development is single family dwellings that are attached. Correct, but you can have a rental that is a townhome because my company owns them. My question was, is it the style that

you're trying to achieve or are you trying to achieve for sale product? It is the style. We also trying to achieve for sale. Zoning cannot and should not really determine ownership type, but what

we've seen and what the board hopefully remembers is that, for example, on Fairfield Avenue, the redevelopment of the site on Waterside was townhomes that are intended for sale. We saw on, I believe

it was on Hope Street, 19 units, townhome development. Those are units that are intended for sale. What we've seen is townhomes for sale. The expectation is that maybe not all of them, but vast

majority of units would be for sale rather than apartments, which we've seen over the last couple of years have been mostly rentals. Okay. I'm still a little confused. Ralph, we do define it in page

4-22. Is that something you can bring up? I can do that. Give me one second. Okay. Here we go. There it is. Number 4. Yes. That's the definition. Once again, it's not about ownership. It's about the

style. As I said, what we've seen over the last couple of years when applications came to the Board, the vast majority or I can't even remember a townhouse development that came to the Board that was

not for sale, which doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. There's also smaller developments are probably as of right, so they wouldn't come to the zoning board necessarily. But what we've seen is

townhomes, the townhomes are primarily for sale. Steve, why don't you, if you get a chance, take a look at this and see if... It's fine. I just, you know, when it was sort of little t, little d, I

wasn't sure whether it was defined because it was different in two different places, but I, you know, this is semantics. I understand what Ralph's trying to achieve here. I think you should just

either reference the section and the zoning so it's clear. Yeah. It should be and maybe it's an editing error. So usually everything that is printed in those space out. It's a term that is defined in

Section 4. So maybe we haven't done that in the proposed text and obviously we can change that. OK, great. Thank you. Yeah, it's not under T in that section. It's not listed. OK, we'll definitely can

make that change. OK, do you keep anything else? No, that was it. OK, Jerry. No, I like the, you know, I understand what Ralph is suggesting here and I really like to see more ownership and I know

he's not doing that specifically, but the townhouses again historically or something. The units that are looking as a commodity that generally is for sale. So I would love to see more ownership. So I

definitely support this. Good. Roseanne. I have two questions. And I agree with everybody. Single family homes are so outrageously expensive in this city, of course, across Fairfield County. So

townhouses, I think, are happily something that I think we need. So two questions. The first is, is it 30 percent enough to encourage? Can we do 35 percent? I mean, it's unusual to be asking for more

building on these properties, but is that the coverage number? That's the coverage. Yeah. Yeah, the coverage number. And I only to you know, if we're going to try to entice developers to do more

townhouses. Good point. Yeah, I mean, it is five percent more than apartment buildings provide. So we think it's a good number. We've done a little bit of modeling and it seems to work, but obviously

it's your regulation. I mean, I don't want to crowd these properties. I mean, 30 percent just doesn't seem I don't know. It's hard to know. I mean, you've probably spoken to some of the development

community or their attorneys. Are you getting a sense from them that they would like a higher number or are they pretty happy? They always want a higher number. I don't ask a bad question. Yeah. Yeah.

The thing is that let me put it that way. When you look at Longwood Road, 120 Longwood Road, there's this one component of this townhome development that they made work with the 25 percent coverage.

And so we think that the 30 percent gives them a nice extra bump, but we are confident that it works. And I think, as you mentioned, it is really sort of the balance to not make it feel crowded and

cramped and encouraging at the same time the ownership development. And the other thing that helps is that we increase the building height a little bit. So there's also more space vertically that

people can use. Which is actually probably better. Yeah. So we think it works. My second question is, we have a number of developments in town where they're not townhouses because they're not

attached, but they're very close together, like King Arthur Estates at the end of Portland, the bigger development that's on I think Interlochen. They're like, I can't remember what street that is.

Would those be covered in this? And if not, can we add them? Because they're just like townhouses and they're all condo associations. They're just not attached. Are they cluster or they're not? No,

they're just like really narrow space between them. It's just so you don't share a wall. Yeah. So those are single family home, I guess. But they are run just like it would be townhouses, you know.

Well, they have a homeowners association, I think is what you're saying. And they have very small little pieces of property, you know, you don't have big yards. I mean, I don't know why we wouldn't

like those as much as we would townhouses. I mean, it's it's something that I think can be achieved with with other zoning districts and other regulations. So to be added to this. I mean, if we were

adding it, we probably have to go back to start. But we can certainly if that's something that you would like to facilitate something that we could consider in a future tax change. I just think we

should look at those because a lot of people want that kind of living but don't want to share a wall. So some sort of like cluster development without if you look at those two development more than

two in town. But those are the two I know. Yeah, those are those are like our district. So that's that's cluster development. But I think it would probably work density wise. So we could we could

certainly propose something like that. I know the King Arthur one only because I have a friend that lives there. There's only like six feet in between the units. It's, you know, it's just like

townhouse living, it's just that you don't share a wall so there's not that noise. Yeah, I think I think that's a good idea. We want to I think we want to make this CD as flexible as possible. And if

the developer would like to build those kinds of homes, that's it's a good idea to let them do it. I agree. Yeah, we can we can come back to you. I mean, it's up to you if you want us to incorporate

the changes here. But I think then we would have to start from scratch with this one or we can come back with with an amendment to this. Right. Who add that as an additional option for for

development. It's just one of the expensive to go ahead. It's just more expensive to build that way. Right. Yeah, I just want to offer the choice to developers. You know, if there's but I, I would be

in favor of like approving this if we approve it, and then coming back with an amendment, just so we can try to encourage as soon as possible. Since our process so long. I agree. I think we should

keep this one moving. Yeah, that's it for me. Okay, Bill. Yeah, following up a little bit on what Rosanne was talking about, making it more attractive for developers. Do you think that for the town

hall developments the divider you're recommending is 2000 you think that's too high. Go back down to maybe 1500 or that because density problems. I mean, that would that would increase the number of

units that you can have. Yeah, the coverage remains. Yeah, yeah, the coverage remains the same. The coverage might become the, the threshold. Then I think they might hit a wall. Yeah, so that's,

that's really, and I mean, the idea is obviously that a townhome is generally bigger than an apartment. So that's why we decided to increase and give it that extra bump. I mean, it doesn't mean that

it has to be that big. It can be smaller but it's really just determining the number of units that you understand but I guess it's math but I mean, let's say when to pick a number you don't 1750. That

make a substantial difference in the density or the development. I mean, that's, that's why we actually increased if we go back. So, what we try to do is, so we increase both the FAR, and the

residential density divider, the idea being that you get the same maximum number of units or about the same maximum number of units than if you were to develop a townhouse. But the units can be bigger

than if you were doing the apartment development so we try to balance those two things. Okay. Well, wouldn't, wouldn't making the residential density divider smaller as Bill is proposing, wouldn't

allow if it may allow more units and they could be smaller units and therefore less expensive, and we might be able to provide units for people who couldn't afford a bigger unit. I mean, yes, but the

other thing that we try to balance here is that when you have more units, even though the units are smaller you generate more traffic. So, we try to stay at the same density, but of course yeah you

can make the residential density by the smaller and then you would get with the same FAR, you would get more units out of it. I mean, the average single family home is, I think, between like 2,000

2500 square feet. Nowadays, and once again, this is only the residential density dividers only to cap the maximum number of units, that's, that's on a site. So, a developer could decide to do 1800

square foot units, but they wouldn't be able to increase the number beyond what you get by dividing the floor area by 2000 with regard to density. Right, so they would still, they get fewer units.

Yeah, and I mean, that doesn't really deal with the affordability question. Yeah, no, I think, I think that's, that's certainly a discussion. We should have, but I mean, my hope would also be that

it's not just like one type of units that is provided but that within a development, you have smaller townhomes and larger townhomes so that you have something for different price points, which in

many instances is what's already been been done. There's going to be like two or three different types. So some of them might be 1800 square feet, others 2300. So, so you get both. Bill, say your,

your thought for the deliberation, we should, I think we should revisit that. Yeah, and if I can follow one more thing is that for the senior housing, you're recommending RDD of 1500. Yeah. And also

for affordable, I don't think that's ever going to happen so I'll just talk about the senior housing. Now, but if they if half half of development is going to be senior housing and the rest of the was

not would they be able to use both dividers, it would be prorated. And I mean, that's, that's the hope. I mean, in many instances. But it's not only something speaking about the, the, like

affordability and and like starter homes. It means looking into the subdivision regulations and allowing for smaller lots. So first of all, that would be something that the planning board would have

to do. And I think also I think really where we should and I'm not quite sure how we can get there, but also really thinking about how can we make our neighborhoods, like the single family

neighborhoods more diverse that you have smaller lots with smaller buildings, like houses and larger lots with larger buildings that then accommodate like senior housing a smaller senior housing unit

next to a unit that is more for families, and so on. That's definitely a discussion we should we should have and continue to have, but I think this is an important first step to to work on increased

homeownership opportunities. I'm sorry, Bill, anything else. Okay. Yeah, and I would agree with the comments from the board that this is a good proposal and hopefully will result in in more housing

for people living in Stanford. Don't deal with the shortage that we now have as well as helping the office parts and increasing the grand list. And with that, why don't we go to the public. If there's

anyone from the public who'd like to speak on this, please raise your hand. No hands, as of now, I don't have any speaker. There we go. First we have Miss Monica 12 is 12 can you unmute. There you go.

Good evening. I live downtown, and I have lived here all my life and I think it would be a wonderful livable scale to keep the high region language as traditionally has always been single family home,

which is one of the very foremost communities in Stanford that actually throughout Stanford throughout them single family homes were worthy thing and that will be that should should bring in a lot

more diversity. If you want to use that word and family life. Thank you. I oppose that this text change. Thank you. Thank you. There's a little bit of lag so Dave, Dave Adams, Glenbrook road,

Glenbrook. Can you hear me well. Yeah. Okay, thank you. Because there's still lag on my side. I'm not sure I entirely understand this change, but if the intentions are pure, and this is about

increasing the number of townhomes versus say apartments or other style units that are less desirable and are less likely to be for home ownership, or, you know, individual ownership. I 100% align

with the intention to increase opportunity for ownership. So I appreciate your mission to or your concentration on that issue. And if that is the true intent here. Like I said, I'm not, I don't have a

firm grasp on it but I would be fully in support of such a change that does that. And those are my thoughts. Thank you very much. Thank you for putting up with me yet again. Thank you. And our

intentions are always pure. Okay, no other speakers in the list. Okay. We're off anything you feel the need to respond to. Yeah, I think I just wanted to reiterate that that we're talking about land

that traditionally has been occupied by large suburban office parks with hundreds or even thousands of employees. And the proposal is to hopefully create home ownership opportunities for families of

different sizes. So, I think, I'm with Mr. Adams here that this hopefully is a good way to increase homeownership opportunities in areas of town where we've had before large office parks with hundreds

or thousands of employees, where we had nothing for a while because those office buildings were empty and did not contribute to the grant list or solving the housing crisis. So, that's all, I think,

any final questions from the board. Then, I think we can close this application. No one has any objections to application two to six dash 14 is close. I'd like to take a break if people want to do the

next two or you want to break now, any reference free. I hear break. Okay, at least, at least you have modern facilities available here. This is good. Okay, let's take a 10 minute break. It's 913. So

let's come back at 923. Almost there. Okay, why don't we continue? It is October 19, 2026. The zoning board is now back in session. The next public hearing deals with two applications, application

two, two, six dash two, four and two, two, six dash two, three. Two, four is the text change purpose of this text amendment is to delete the CSC district regulation section five J from the city zoning

regulations to simplify the regulations. This text is accompanied by an application to rezone the city's only CSC dash D community shopping center design district and an adjoining parcel to the CL

zoning district. The accompanying map change is application two, two, six dash two, three applicant and it's a zoning board application applicant is seeking a zoning map change from the current CSC

dash D design community shopping center and CN neighborhood business zoning district to the CL limited business zoning district for the properties located at 2215 summer street and 2510 Bedford

street. Roseanne, could you please read the two planning board letters. You're on mute though. Just switch screens. September 23 2026 to Mr. David Stein chair city of Stanford zoning board regarding

CV application to to six dash to four. Stanford zoning board text change dear Mr. Stein and members of the zoning board during its meeting Helen Tuesday September 22 2026 planning board reviewed the

above caption application referred in accordance with the requirements of the Stanford charter. The purpose of this text change is to delete the CSC district regulations from the city's zoning

regulations to simplify the regulations. Ralph blessing land use bureau chief made a presentation and answered questions from the board. After some discussion the planning board unanimously.

Unanimously recommended approval of zb application to to six dash to four and found this to be in general harmony with a 2035 comprehensive plan sincerely Stanford planning board Jennifer good zeno

chair and David September 23 2026 to Mr. David Stein chair city of Stanford zoning board regarding zb application to six dash to three different zoning board map change your Mr. Stein and members of

the zoning board during its meeting held on Tuesday September 22 2026. The planning board reviewed the above caption application referred in accordance with the requirements of the Stanford charter

purpose of this map change is to rezone the city's only CSC. The community shopping center design district and an adjoining parcel in the CN neighborhood business zoning district to CL limited

business zoning district rough blessing land use bureau chief made a presentation and answered question from the board. After some discussion the planning board unanimously recommended approval of zb

application to 26 dash to three and found this to be in general harmony with 2035 comprehensive plan sincerely Stanford planning board, Jennifer good zeno chair. Good. Thank you. Well, you have the

floor. After you unmute. That's a good point. Can you see my screen. Yep. Yes. Okay, so this map and text change application a companion applications. They both relate to the CSC district. We have

exactly one CSC district in the city, which is the area of the retail shopping center and small lot adjacent to it. The CSC district is very similar with regard to the height and bulk regulations to

the CL district. However, the CSC district is somewhat outdated and doesn't have as many design controls as to CL district which we redid a couple of months ago. So the idea is to strict and replace

it with the CL and also to rezone this little parcel here which I believe has a daycare on it from currently CN to also CL. It looks like this parcel was left over when a couple of other parcels in

the area were resolved. So we have this like spot zoning there. So this is more or less a cleanup action. The text change would incorporate or mean to delete section 5J which are the CSC district

regulations, because there is only one CSC district. Once it's resolved to CL, it becomes obsolete, and it would help making our zoning regulations a little bit easier by reducing the number of

districts. At the request of the property owner, the proposed text change would also have a clarification that existing legal nonconformities could remain. This is really just reassurance because

that's basically what section 10 of the regulations deal with grandfathering and how you deal with leaking nonconformant uses, how you deal with those. But obviously there's no harm in restating that

fact in those district regulations, and that's about it. So it's really remapping the Ridgway Shopping Center to a district that allows exactly the same uses that are currently there, has more design

controls, and gets rid of a zoning district that has not been used widely in the zoning regulations. And that's it for now. Okay, thank you. And it does not create any new nonconformities, does it,

for that parcel? Okay, good. Bill, any questions? I assume the property owners, aside from your amendment there, have no other issues with the changes? Not that we know of. That's it for me. Okay,

Rosanna? It's not even clear if there are any nonconformities because, so the CSC regulations, they really refer back to the CL. So, we didn't think it was necessary to do a detailed zoning analysis

of the existing building, because it was developed under those regulations, and the CL sort of incorporates or encapsulates what's in the CSC. It's a little piece of property that's now the daycare,

which used to be in an architect's office, and it's been different things. So, it can be an office if it wants to convert back from daycare, whatever we're, right? Rob? Sorry, my connection was

disrupted for a second. Can you repeat the question? The little piece of property that has the daycare on it, it used to be an office. I just want to make sure it still couldn't go back to an office.

Yes. That's it for me. Jerry? No questions, Mr. Chairman. I guess they're related. Does this affect any future tendencies or parking requirements that they would want to do down the road? No. So, I

would think that actually the CL is more generous with regard to the uses that are permitted than the CSC district. So, they would have a wider pool of potential tenants. With regard to parking,

actually parking requirements, they refer to Section 12 of the zoning regulations, and we're not touching that. So, the parking requirements stay the same when this is resolved. Okay. Thank you. Good.

Theater? Seems pretty straightforward. No questions. Yep. Okay. And I think it's always a good idea to get rid of zones that have very little use, so I'm glad that Ralph, you're proposing this. Find

some more. The zoning board is proposing. Anyway, I support this. Why don't we go to the public? If anyone from the public wishes to speak on this application, either for or against it, please raise

your hand. Okay. Seeing none. We do have one, Mr. Dave Adams. I just wanted to say that I'm for this amendment, this rezoning. Thank you. Thank you. We also have Ms. Monica 12. I'm against this text

change and rezoning area. I just think that's just putting too much, you guys are very vague and generic and not really explaining to the public what is exactly going on. You're speaking in jargon,

that is CSC, CMCL. You don't give us any explanation. You don't give us any definitive answers. So I'm very uncomfortable with this text change and rezoning, so I'm against it. Okay. Thank you. Seems

to be all the questions. Ralph, anything? I have nothing to add. Thank you. Okay. Board, before we close these, are there any additional questions or comments? No, Mr. Chairman. Okay. Then we are

closing applications 226-24 and 226-23. Next we come to applications 226-26 and 226-25. 226 is a city of Stanford zoning board text change. The purpose of this text change is to delete the MD district

regulations, section 5P from the city zoning regulations to simplify the regulation. This text change is accompanied by an application for the rezoning of the city's only two MD zoning districts to

MLNR-5. The accompanying map change is application 226-25, a zoning board application. The applicant is seeking a zoning map change from the current MD designed industrial zoning districts to the ML

light industrial and R-5 multiple family medium density design zoning district. The property is located at 80 Brownhouse Road, 328 Soulock Street, 1 Blatchley Road, and 202 Blatchley Road. Roseanne,

could you please read the two planning board letters? Certainly. September 23rd, 2026 to Mr. David Stein, Chair, City of Stanford Zoning Board, regarding CV application 226-26, Stanford Zoning Board

text change. Here, Mr. Stein and members of the zoning board, during its meeting held on Tuesday, September 22nd, 2026, planning board reviewed the above captioned application, referred in accordance

with the requirements of the Stanford Charter. Purpose of this text change is to delete the MD district from the city's zoning regulations to simplify the regulations. Ralph Bussing, land use bureau

chief, made a presentation and answered questions from the board. After some discussion, the planning board unanimously recommended approval of CV application number 226-26 and found this to be in

general harmony with the 2035 comprehensive plan. Sincerely, Stanford Planning Board, Jennifer Gazzeno, Chair. And September 23rd, 2026 to Mr. David Stein, Chair, City of Stanford Zoning Board,

regarding CV application 226-25, Stanford Zoning Board, map change. Dear Mr. Stein and members of the zoning board, during its meeting held on Tuesday, September 22nd, 2026, planning board reviewed

the above captioned application, referred in accordance with the requirements of the Stanford Charter. The purpose of this map change is to rezone the current MD designed industrial zoning district

properties to the ML, light industrial, and R5, multiple family medium density designed zoning districts. Ralph Bussing, land use bureau chief, made a presentation and answered questions from the

board. After some discussion, the planning board unanimously recommended approval of CV application number 226-25 and found this to be in general harmony with the 2035 comprehensive plan. Sincerely,

Stanford Planning Board, Jennifer Gazzeno, Chair. Okay, as you may remember, a while ago, the beginning of this meeting, we continued item two, which was a text change, which involved the ML district

because there was some discussion about optimal changes to that text. Since both of these applications also relate to the ML, they will be continued 226-26 and 226-25 will be continued to our next

meeting on October 26, 2026 at 630 on June. And our last public hearing tonight is application 226-28, City of Stanford zoning board zoning text change. The purposes of this text change is to update

section 9A1J to comply with recently adopted public act 25-33, which removes the exemption for new single family home construction located outside designated flood hazard areas from coastal site plan

review. The amendment also refines the criteria for exemptions to section 9A1J for clarity and removes duplicative language. Rosanne, could you please read the planning board letter on this one?

Certainly, September 23, 2026 to Mr. David Stein, Chair, City of Stanford zoning board regarding ZB application number 226-28, Stanford zoning board text change, here Mr. Stein and members of the

zoning board. During its meeting held on Tuesday, September 22, 2026, the planning board reviewed the above caption application referred in accordance for the requirements of the Stanford charter. The

purpose of this text change is to comply with recently adopted public act 25-33, which removes the exemption for new single family home construction located outside designated flood hazard areas from

coastal site plan review. The amendment also refines the criteria for exemptions in section 9A for clarity and removes duplicative language. Ralph Blesing, land use bureau chief, made a presentation

and answered questions from the board. After some discussion, the planning board unanimously recommended approval of ZB application number 226-28 and found this to be in general harmony with the 2035

comprehensive plan. Sincerely, Stanford planning board, Jennifer Gudzano, chair. Thank you. Ralph, the floor is yours. For the record, Vinita gave the presentation. So, the probably confused at the

planning board, and Vinita will present this to you. So, okay, Vinita, the floor is yours. Thank you. I'm sharing my screen. Can you all see the slides? Yes. Yes. I'm just giving an overview of the

coastal site plan review process. You know, most of you are pretty familiar with this coastal site plan. I think Vinita's frozen. Yeah, but he is frozen. All right, Ralph, we got a retirement here.

Okay, you're a relief pitcher, Ralph. Let's see if she's coming back because I actually can't control the presentation and I don't have the presentation. View is required based on the Connecticut

General Statue. Oh my gosh, she never stopped talking. Vinita? I'm back. We lost you right at the beginning. Yes. All right. Let's try this again. And I'll just maybe keep my video off because the

internet doesn't seem to be good. So, can you all see my screen? Yes. So, on this map, the area highlighted in yellow is the CAM boundary. So, all uses, structures, and buildings require CAM review

except if they're listed as exceptions. And the coastal site plan review involves review by all the departments, the hardware management commission reviews it at their application review committee,

their full commission meeting. DEEP also provides their comments. And then finally, you know, the zoning board makes the decision. So, the general statute has a list of exemptions, which is more

general, and each municipality is allowed to have stricter regulations within those allowed exemptions. Some of the CAM area is within the flood hazard area, which is the A zone and X zone, but other

areas are outside the flood zone. So, there's less risk of impact to the coastal areas when work happens in those areas. So, most activities within flood prone areas is not exempt under the statute or

under our regulations. So, the reason for this amendment is twofold. There was one major change in the exemptions allowed by state statute, primarily single family home construction outside the flood

hazard areas was permitted without the need for a coastal site plan review prior to that public act. So, with the new, with the change in the statute, new single family home construction is now

subject to coastal site plan review. This is just for the areas outside the flood hazard area. Anything within the flood hazard area is required to have undergo the site plan, coastal site plan

review. So, we are updating, updating our regulations to be consistent with that change in the exemptions. And then secondly, our list of exemptions was narrower. And it also contained, it also

required review of certain improvements such as which mainly pertain to internal improvements or internal increase of floor area or improvements within the existing footprint of the building. And what

we've seen over time is that those kind of changes or increase in floor area doesn't have any impact on the site drainage or, you know, construction related impact is also not that significant,

nothing that cannot be handled during the building permit process. You know, the additional levels of review by Management Commission DEEP and the scheduling at the zoning board adds administrative

time and cost for the homeowners and without adding much additional oversight. So, the idea of this amendment was to eliminate those types of reviews. So, to allow us, you know, to streamline the list

of exemptions so that it can, you know, it relates to the building coverage for the properties rather than, you know, increase in floor area. So, this is, that's what we've done. So, we've removed

some of the redundant language just to make it easier for applicants to interpret the standard and see whether they're exempt or not. So, the floor area increased threshold of 25% that many times

inadvertently included, not inadvertently, but just by the fact that people converted their basements or attics, those were also now subject to review. They were not adding any intensity to the

property use. So, this is what is being removed from the exemptions. And then we're remaining, you know, retaining some of the standards that are already there, like the building coverage increased

threshold of 25% that will remain as such. Increase of floor area threshold of 2500 square feet for anything in the flood hazard area. That's just another check above the 25% building coverage

threshold. This would apply to the flood hazard areas. The exemptions for the change of use remains the same. This is exactly what the statute says. The exemptions for improvements that conserve

natural resources that will, you know, stay as such and, you know, you're also exempt when you're, you know, making minor improvements to the properties like fences, walks or terraces. So, that's

really it for this text amendment. Hopefully, you know, what it does is that allows the coastal site land review process to focus on projects that actually impact or, you know, changes to the

buildings, which don't really impact, you know, the site as much. So, the bottom line is that there will be more exemptions and therefore fewer CSPR applications coming to us. Yes, I think we might

get like 2 or 3 out of 10 less. Good. Good. Okay. Is that it, Vanita? That's it. Okay. Thank you. I forward. Bill, any questions? It seems reasonable to match the state statute, so I have no issues or

questions. Pretty easy. Rosanne? You're muted. Again, I agree. It'll save some homeowners a bit of money, so I'm all for this. Absolutely. Yeah. Jerry? I agree. I like that it's, you know, it complies

with the state and it's going to save folks money, so I totally agree with this application. Stepping the right direction. Okay. Keith? I have nothing on this one. I concur with my fellow board

members. Peter? I agree with everybody else. Looks good to me. I agree with Peter. So, it's good for the homeowners and it's good for us if we have fewer of these applications coming to us.

Absolutely. So, let's go to the public. If anyone from the public wishes to speak on this, please raise your hand. Vanita, could you make me a co-host again? I think I got unbooked. You are still a

co-host. Am I? Yeah. Okay. Okay. We have Mr. Dave Adams. Good evening, board. It's been a while. Yeah, it's been, you know, maybe possibly, you know, 10 minutes. So, just for a little clarity, I'm

sorry, because I'm a little confused here. But if you, if you're removing an exemption for new home construction, I understand that there's probably not a ton of new home construction. But if there's

a removal of that exemption, I'm just confused. Go ahead. They have to come to us or they have to file the application and get it approved. For any new home construction, but wouldn't that be, you

know, I mean, only in the coastal, but anything in the coastal flood area, it's, as of right, becomes more challenging, right? Because you're, you have to follow the state's rules. Right. So, I'm

just, I'm just confused. So, this exemption, but this is going to alleviate a lot of the requirements, a lot of, it's going to streamline a lot of the other exemptions, like fences, et cetera, et

cetera, et cetera. But if, correct me if I'm wrong, Ms. Mather, but you, you had said that if they wanted to, you know, build out their attic, then they would have to apply, right? So, that

exemption's being removed. No. Okay. If it doesn't change the footprint of the house, even if the outer floor area, it's exempt. Okay. Got it. Now I understand. And it's only now just that earlier new

home construction was exempt, and now it is not. And so, just like most building and planning, some sort of application is going to need to be reviewed by coastal flood or something to that effect.

Correct? That's right. Okay. All right. Then, thank you for the clarification, and I'm in support. Thank you very much. Thank you. I don't see any other speakers. Okay. Then... Actually, we have Ms.

Toole. David, we have Ms. Toole. Okay. Once again, Vanita, you gave a wonderful speech, but half of it, I couldn't hear it. You froze. When a certain exemption, when a certain sentence, everybody

thought they were getting the idea of what you were going to say, you froze again. And I don't know how we can even, like David said, confuse. Confusion, confusion, confusion. Anyway, I'd like you to

pick a random property and apply this text change. And also, what exactly are the properties that are... Did you say there are some properties that are excluded from this boundary? Could you tell us

what they are? Okay. So, the exemptions are based on what work is being proposed on a property. So, if the work that's being proposed is within the existing building or within the existing footprint,

so you're adding a second story to a portion of your building or you're finishing an internal space, then you would be exempt. But if you're increasing the building coverage by more than 25%, so

you're pumping out a living space or a kitchen or something, your building is increasing in size, that is beyond 25% of the existing building coverage, then you are required to undergo the Coastal

Site Plan Review. And there's the additional threshold of 2500 square feet. So, if the lower of those threshold 25% or 2500 square feet, that is when you do have to go through the Coastal Site Plan

Review process. The other change was the change that the state required. Previously, single family home construction outside of the Flood Hazard Area was exempt from the Coastal Site Plan Review. The

state removed that exemption, so we have no choice, but we have to list that as one of the activities that's no longer exempt. That means we just, we struck it from the exemption list. So those are

the thresholds. We are trying to align our regulations to what the state statute allows us to do. Good. Thank you. All right. Board, any other questions? Then we're going to close application 226-28.

Now we're into the regular meeting. Okay. First item we have is approval of the minutes of September 28th, funded 26th. Are there any changes or corrections to it? Mr. Chair, can you prove that we

approved the minutes of September 28th, 2026, as presented? Okay. Second. I'm sorry, who was there for that? Abstention. I was not. Okay. Not there, but I did watch them listen now. Okay. So I think

that it would be Bill, Roseanne, myself, and Peter, you were there? I think so, yes. Okay. So Bill, you moved it. Was there a second? I'll second it. Okay. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. They're

approved for zero. Monita, just make sure I've got this right. It looks to me like the next one that we would vote on would be number 13, 226-15. Give me one second. Yeah, I think that's correct.

Twenty-seven was continued to next week. Okay. So can we bring that text change up? Do we have it? - Have it? - Yes. So, as a reminder, this is a cleanup which consists of two parts. The first one

adds some of the regulations for additional notification of the public to the ZBA. It also reintroduces or makes the ZBA the guardian of location approvals for gas stations and for dealers and repairs

licenses. This is because of a change in the state statute, so this goes back in. This just clarifies that the notice requirements, that they also apply to the ZBA. This is all the notice

requirements. For the modification of special permits, for minor modifications, it also clarifies that it's not only for zoning board special permits, but also for ZBA special permits that they can be

approved by staff, as is already the case for zoning board special permits. Same for site plan approvals. There's also clarification for temporary structures, so everything that is up for less than

seven days doesn't require zoning permit. They might still need a building permit to make sure that the structure is safe, but they don't need a zoning permit. There's a change to the transfer of

development rights section. We already have a provision that private property donated to the city for a use such as a daycare center, playground, park, that those properties can transfer development

rights. We're just adding another use, so if someone would give a property to the city for a yard or a workshop, they would also be able to benefit from the transfer of development rights. And then

there's just a minor addition to the R6 single and two family districts pointing to the street tree requirements and the signage requirements. They were already subject to those requirements, it's

just adding that cross reference. We're adding some districts that would require the publicly accessible amenity space for lots, one acre larger, so the NXT, the RMF and the VC district. We're adding

a couple of districts where the waterfront requirements would need to be met. We're adding an addition that for the usage of any PAS, no fee can be taken, so obviously we don't want anyone to ask for

a fee if someone wants to go to the waterfront. We're also adding that for large public plazas, that there should be a publicly accessible restroom, same for publicly accessible waterfront areas, same

for publicly accessible parks. We're also adding a clarification that community rooms count twice, because obviously it's more expensive to build a community room than just paving a plaza and putting

some trees in there. We're adding minor changes to the childcare, public amenity, and we're also adding a provision that the publicly accessible amenity space requirement can be met by providing a

publicly accessible restroom. So that's all the regulations in connection with the restrooms. We have changed with regard to the fee in lieu payments. We've seen for certain in certain districts, an

increase in fee in lieu payments. So in order to have more onsite developments, we're bumping up the fee in lieu for development in the CDR5, RM1 and RMF districts. They were at 150, we're proposing

to increase those to 200 with the hope, obviously, to have more onsite units rather than fee in lieu. And then there is a number of corrections to Appendix B, it's minor, mostly language stuff. And

this is also related to actually the table in Appendix B, which is also subject of this application. Not sure if you can you see the table. Yes. So the changes are highlighted. You might recall that

we added all the districts that we have in here and reorganize the table. So in the process, there were some clerical errors with regard to footnotes that we forgot to add or added in some instances

where they don't apply anymore. So this is a correction of those footnotes and everything, all the changes are highlighted in yellow in the table just to make it a little bit easier to figure it out.

But as I said, it's really the footnotes and the notes that are adjusted here to account for adding all the other districts to this table and adding additional requirements to the columns in the

table. And that's it. Sorry, I didn't mean to close that. Okay, this is very good and it took care of a lot of smaller issues that we had as well as a couple of larger. I'd like to know that we

approve Application 226-15 as presented. I'll second that. Okay. Just to be sure, this was presented last week. For those who were absent last week, are you now qualified? Did you see the-- I saw the

tape, Mr. Chairman, but I'm happy to withdraw my support if needed. Well, if you saw the tape, then you can vote. Keith? I saw the table, so-- Okay, good. We had a second? Yeah, I seconded, Mr.

Chairman. Okay, any discussion? All in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. I can't see everybody because of this text. Sorry. One more time. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstentions? Application 226-15

is approved. Next is Application 226-16. Ralph, you want to-- Yes, give me one second. That's the CN. Yes. Got it. So share real quick. So just as a reminder, this is the overhaul of the CN

neighborhood commercial district regulations. So overall, what we tried to do is-- So this was one of the districts that didn't really have a chapter in the book. We added designation criteria,

purpose section. We didn't make a whole lot of changes to the development standards, but we added a lot of urban design guidelines and requirements in the section that didn't exist before. So that's

basically the gist of it. We also added-- So this is all the urban design standards. We also added application and review procedures. So for small changes or just a change in use without any increase

in floor area, for example, you only need a zoning permit, and then obviously for larger developments, you would need a special permit, including a public hearing or site plan approval, depending on

the thresholds we have established. And then one request was from some of the property owners to add a sentence that existing legal nonconformities may continue to exist, provided that an existing

nonconformity is not increased. And this is also what we've seen before with the CL district regulations. This is just restating what section 10 and the state statute already says. It would also add a

couple of streets to the list of commercial streets in the CN district. We didn't have commercial streets. Once again, it doesn't mean that there's necessarily businesses. It just means that along a

commercial street, certain urban design requirements apply. And this is just a cleanup to remove the CN from the large-scale development review, because we put the review requirement actually here

that on sites one acre or larger, you need a large-scale development review. Good. Any questions or discussion on this? Okay. There is a place where we had to fill that date in? Yes. The yellow? Yes.

So we would put in the effective date. So basically two weeks from if you decide to approve this, the effective date of this regulation. Okay. Any discussion? If not, can we get a motion to approve

application 226-16? Mr. Chairman, I move that we approve application 226-16 as presented and discussed this evening. Okay. Is there a second? Second. Second. Okay. Any further discussion? All right.

All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstention. The application is approved. All right. Cruising along here. The next one I have is 16 and 17 on our agenda. 16 we just did. No. You're talking about

number 16 and 17, not application. Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. It's 226, 22, and 21, which is the BD. Yeah. The BD. So here I would suggest to first discuss the map change, which is 21. Okay. So

second. So this is one of the cleanup actions where we're trying to get rid of a district. So this one here is the BD zoning district. Okay. And then a couple of lots just to the south of it. And the

proposal is to rezone the BD to the CN. We just approved the CN district, which now actually has more design controls than the BD district. Actually the BD is very similar to the CN with regard to

height regulations, density, and all those things. So it's that's the purpose would be to get rid of the only BD district that's mapped in the city. Okay. Any discussion? Mr. Chairman, I moved that we

approve application, the map change application number 226-21. Okay. Second. I second that Mr. Chairman. Okay. Any further discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstentions. The map change

for 226-21 is approved. Now, 226-22. So that is the companion application, which would basically, it just proposes to delete the BD district regulations. One second. It's one of our easier text

changes. It basically just says delete section 5B and then update the table of contents, all references, and so on and so forth. Okay. Good. Any discussion on this? Just for refresher, Ralph, as I

recall, the property owners had no opposition to this. Yes. There was this one for the CN regulations. They asked to add the sentence about the nonconforming properties, which we did. So that was the

only concern which we addressed. I'm good, Ralph. David. Can we get a motion on this? Sure. Ms. Chairman, I move that we approve application 226-22, the text change. Okay. Is there a second? Second.

Okay. Any further discussion? Can we take this down, please, Ralph? Oh, sorry. Okay. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstentions. The application is approved. Okay. That's the last one I have

that I'm showing we need to vote on before we get to administrative review. Ralph, do you have any others? I think we have 23 and 24, 226-23 and 226-24. There's an administrative review, David. Those,

now those we did tonight, those were new applications. And they may have closed them, but we'll vote on those next week. Yeah. Anything else? Nope. Okay. I think that's it. Yeah. We have the MD, which

we'll continue to next week. Okay. Good. Then we have our two extensions of time. The first one is for application 223-34, 900 Long Ridge Road, the special permit. They are requesting an extension of

time from January 2nd, 27th to January 2nd, 28th. If I've got that right. I move that we approve application 223-34 requesting an extension of time. I second that. Okay. All in favor say aye. Aye.

Aye. Opposed? Abstentions. Okay. Passes 5-0. Peter, unfortunately you can't vote since we have everybody here. Sorry. The last one is application 221-24 Old Town Square LLC 160 Atlantic Street. This

is the property that was the proposal to build a hotel over the bank. They're requesting a one-year extension from October 4th, 2026 to October 4th, 2027. Some sharp-eyed people noted that it's

already expired. They did put in the request before actually in August, and we inadvertently did not put it on the agenda. So this can still be approved by us. I'll make that a motion, Mr. Chairman.

Is there a second? Second. Okay. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstentions. Okay. The extension is approved. So for next week we have the text amendments and map changes that we closed

tonight. Manita, what else do we have? We have a new public hearing, which is the CL zoning district change for 110 High Ridge Road. That's the parking lot north of the Whole Foods. That's it. So they

want to -- that's a map change, right? Yeah. And they want to change the zoning from -- is it residential to commercial? It's from RM1 to CL. Okay. And there's no proposal yet for a project there? No.

Okay. Good. Board, anything to discuss before we adjourn? Well, okay. Can we get a motion to adjourn? So moved. Second. Okay. We're adjourned. Thank you, everyone, and see you next week. Good night,

everybody. Good night, everyone. Good night. Next week