The bland business of business took top billing at the Huntersville Town Board’s first August meeting Monday night.
Proposals for loading dock lighting, signage rules adjustments and the continuing saga of a cellular telephone tower on the southwestern edge of town were each public hearing topics as commissioners heard reports and compiled information in anticipation of final votes at some future date.
In fact, the only votes taken at Monday’s session were to approve amendments to Parks and Recreation Committee bylaws, put a stamp of approval on minutes from previous sessions and to adjourn.
The outdoor lighting issue emerged from plans for the brightest star on Huntersville’s industrial horizon. ABB, in the process of constructing a $90 million-plus, 250,000-square-foot electricity transmission cable production facility in Commerce Station off N.C. 115, wants to install taller than- allowed light poles and floodlights to illuminate the outdoor loading and storage space on the company’s site.
The planning staff recommends an amendment to zoning code allowing light poles 40 feet high, 10 feet taller than the current limit, and the use of downward-directed floodlights to meet ABB’s needs.
Commissioners spoke of concerns about “light trespass” into surrounding neighborhoods and an unwanted, continuous glow on the skyline, but reassurances from Senior Planner Brad Priest and the Town Planner Jack Simoneau about the proposed revisions seemed to summarize the public hearing’s content.
“We spent a lot of time on this,” Simoneau told the board. “We looked at guidelines from other towns and I feel comfortable with the wording of the proposed ordinance.”
Proposed landscaping at ABB’s 23-acre site, and the fact that the illuminated area will be blocked on three sides by buildings, were also factors highlighted by planning staff members and David Jenkins, ABB’s construction manager.
The signage issue was more numbers-driven than aesthetic. American Asset Corp., developer of the 428-acre Bryton development off Alexanderana Everette Keith and Old Statesville roads in southeastern Huntersville, has submitted a request for more signage space than is allowed under current town guidelines.
The developer, on behalf of Bryton’s first tenant, Walmart, wants more than 450 square feet of sign space for a project that, under existing town guidelines, would qualify for 32 square feet. AAC wants more directional signs — 25 instead of the recommended three — and larger signs on the store building.
Brian Richards, the town’s geographic information systems administrator, said given the overall size and eventual complexity of Bryton, and using a signage formula comparing Birkdale (at 55 acres) to Bryton, the town staff worked out a plan to allow more than 250 square feet of signage.
Still not enough, according to AAC representative Barry James.
“The town’s ordinance doesn’t allow a building this size,” James said during his time addressing the board, “so using the existing sign ordinance doesn’t make sense.”
But Richards said Walmart’s plan to face the store toward an interior parking lot instead of a road reduced the allowed signage and he says the package proposed by the town is a fair compromise.
“We’ve put together a plan that provides a 700 percent increase over what would be allowed,” Richards said, “instead of the 1,300 percent increase they asked for.”
The cellular tower discussion was continued from the board’s last meeting, but judging from the time spent on the topic, apparently there was still plenty to talk about. The issues boiled down to the pluses of expanded service versus the visual effects of a tower in a rural setting and the precedent established by the spot zoning required to allow construction of the facility.
Pegasus Tower LLC wants to build a 195-foot tower, with a four-foot lightning rod extension, on a 1.5-acre tract inside a 19-acre piece of property owned by the Reames family on Mt. Holly-Huntersville Road on the southwestern outskirts of town. Jonathan Yates, speaking for the petitioners, said the tower would enhance in-home cellular service to a large area and the town would be equipped to handle equipment for as many as four cellular service providers.
Commissioners want quality cellular service access for town residents, and some view the tower as a necessary by-product of modern convenience. But other commissioners worry about the potential proliferation of towers and how the town’s ordinances and carefully orchestrated plans for the future will endure if projects that don’t meet town standards are approved.
Senior Planner Whitney Hodges said the planning staff does not recommend approval of tower plans because of the spot zoning issue, and because there appear to be other, less intrusive options available for providing the service.
All of the public hearing topics will continue to undergo review by planning staff and planning board before returning to the town board for thumbs-up/thumbs-down decisions.
