# Planning Commission Zoning Items - September 25, 2025 > Auto-transcribed civic record · Commission · September 25, 2025 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/6579 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/6579?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2025-09-25 - **Body**: Commission - **Last revised**: February 15, 2026 - **Length**: 27,178 words - **Speakers**: Chair > ⚠️ **Auto-generated content.** Audio from the official Granicus video was auto-transcribed by OpenAI Whisper-1, with speaker labels folded in from Granicus closed-captioning. Structured facts were extracted with GPT-4o; the narrative summary was written by Anthropic Claude Sonnet. Speaker labels and verbatim wording may contain errors. See [methodology](https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/about/methodology) or [report a correction](mailto:editor@lexingtonky.news). --- ## Meeting Overview The Urban County Planning Commission convened on September 25, 2025, at 1:30 PM in the Council Chamber on the 2nd Floor of the LFUCG Government Center, located at 200 East Main Street, Lexington, Kentucky. The Commission addressed a total of 5 agenda items, which included zoning map amendments, a development plan, and a regulatory amendment. Of the 5 items considered, 3 were approved and 2 were postponed — the War Admiral Place, LLC Zoning Map Amendment and the Scotty Baesler Zoning Map Amendment were both deferred, while the CS Acquisition Vehicle, LLC Zoning Map Amendment, the Lyndhurst Subdivision Block C Development Plan, and an Amendment to Manufactured Housing Regulations were all approved. The Commission heard 5 public comments and took 5 votes over the course of the meeting. ## Attendance The following members were recorded for the Commission meeting on 2025-09-25: **Present:** - Zach Davis - Ivy Barksdale *(arrived late)* - Molly Davis - Johnathon Davis - Larry Forester - Robin Michler - Bruce Nicol - Frank Penn - Bill Wilson - Judy Worth **Absent:** - Mike Owens Ten of the eleven members were present at the meeting. Ivy Barksdale attended but arrived late. Mike Owens was the only member absent from the session. ## Votes and Decisions The Commission took action on five items during the September 25, 2025 meeting. - **PLN-MAR-25-00010 – War Admiral Place, LLC Zoning Map Amendment:** Frank Penn moved to postpone, seconded by Judy Worth. The motion passed unanimously, 9–0, with all nine commissioners voting in favor: Zach Davis, Molly Davis, Johnathon Davis, Larry Forester, Robin Michler, Bruce Nicol, Frank Penn, Bill Wilson, and Judy Worth. - **PLN-MAR-25-00013 – Scotty Baesler Zoning Map Amendment:** Bill Wilson moved to postpone, seconded by Judy Worth. The motion passed unanimously, 9–0, with the same nine commissioners voting in favor. [timestamp: 0:11:13] - **PLN-MAR-25-00014 – Zone Change for CS Acquisition Vehicle, LLC:** Larry Forester moved to approve, seconded by Bill Wilson. The motion passed 8–2 on a roll call vote. Voting in favor: Zach Davis, Ivy Barksdale, Molly Davis, Johnathon Davis, Larry Forester, Robin Michler, Bruce Nicol, and Bill Wilson. Voting against: Frank Penn and Judy Worth. [timestamp: 3:08:24] - **PLN-MJDP-25-00051 – Development Plan for Lyndhurst Subdivision, Block C:** Larry Forester moved to approve, seconded by Ivy Barksdale. The motion passed 9–1 on a roll call vote, with the condition specifying 18 townhome units. Voting in favor: Zach Davis, Ivy Barksdale, Molly Davis, Johnathon Davis, Larry Forester, Robin Michler, Bruce Nicol, Bill Wilson, and Frank Penn. Voting against: Judy Worth. [timestamp: 3:09:31] - **PLN-ZOTA-25-00007 – Amendment to Manufactured Housing Regulations:** Frank Penn moved to approve, seconded by Judy Worth. The motion passed unanimously, 10–0, with all ten commissioners voting in favor: Zach Davis, Ivy Barksdale, Molly Davis, Johnathon Davis, Larry Forester, Robin Michler, Bruce Nicol, Frank Penn, Bill Wilson, and Judy Worth. [timestamp: 3:18:13] ## Public Comment Five members of the public addressed the Commission during the comment period, with the majority expressing opposition to the proposed development and rezoning. Brayden Semper spoke in support of the project [timestamp: 1:43:26], citing the need for additional housing near UK. Semper also suggested that reducing the amount of parking included in the development could help conserve space. Catherine Pence opposed the development [timestamp: 1:45:37], raising several concerns including increased traffic, the displacement of current residents, and the potential loss of historic architecture in the area. Elena Grace Broderson also opposed the rezoning [timestamp: 1:48:12], focusing her remarks on the importance of preserving historic buildings and maintaining the integrity of the surrounding community. Wendy McAllister spoke specifically to traffic impacts [timestamp: 1:51:57], describing Stone Avenue as a narrow road with blind corners that she characterized as already dangerous. McAllister expressed concern that the development would worsen existing traffic conditions on that street. Richard Shine addressed the Commission on historic preservation [timestamp: 1:55:39], emphasizing the value of protecting historic neighborhoods. Shine also criticized what he described as the financialization of student housing. Notable themes across the public comments included traffic safety, historic preservation, and the effect of the proposed development on existing residents. Opposition speakers outnumbered supporters four to one. ## Contested Items - **CS Acquisition Vehicle, LLC Zoning Map Amendment**: This item drew significant community opposition during the September 25, 2025 Commission meeting. Community members raised concerns across several areas, including historic preservation, increased traffic, and the potential displacement of current residents. The structured data does not specify the outcome of the vote or decision on this amendment, nor does it identify specific individuals or organizations involved in the opposition beyond characterizing it as coming from community members. ## WAR ADMIRAL PLACE, LLC ZONING MAP AMENDMENT This agenda item concerned a zoning map amendment requested by War Admiral Place, LLC. The item was listed as a discussion item on the Commission's agenda for the September 25, 2025 meeting. Daniel Crum was identified as the key speaker associated with this item. No substantive presentation, debate, or concerns were recorded in the available meeting data for this agenda item. The item was **postponed** to a later date and did not advance further during this meeting session. No additional details regarding the specific nature of the proposed zoning map amendment, the property location, the requested zoning classification, or the reasons for postponement are available from the meeting record. ## SCOTTY BAESLER ZONING MAP AMENDMENT [timestamp: 11:13] The Commission took up Agenda Item 2, the Scotty Baesler Zoning Map Amendment, as a discussion item during the September 25, 2025 meeting. Daniel Crum was the key speaker associated with this item. The item was not advanced or decided upon at this meeting. Instead, the Commission postponed the zoning map amendment to a later date. No detailed presentation, debate, or record of specific concerns raised is available from the structured data for this agenda item beyond the postponement action. ## CS ACQUISITION VEHICLE, LLC ZONING MAP AMENDMENT [timestamp: 3:08:24] The Commission took up Agenda Item 3, a zoning map amendment request submitted by CS Acquisition Vehicle, LLC. Key speakers during this portion of the meeting included Jeremy Young and Brandon Gross. The discussion incorporated consideration of public comments as well as staff recommendations prior to the Commission reaching a decision. The record does not detail the specific nature of the rezoning request, the current or proposed zoning designations, or the particular concerns raised during deliberation beyond the general framework of public input and staff review. Following the discussion, the Commission **approved** the zoning map amendment for CS Acquisition Vehicle, LLC. ## LYNDHURST SUBDIVISION, BLOCK C DEVELOPMENT PLAN [timestamp: 3:09:31] The Commission took up Agenda Item 4, a discussion and action on the development plan for Lyndhurst Subdivision, Block C. **Key Speaker:** Chris Chaney **Discussion:** - Chris Chaney presented the development plan for Lyndhurst Subdivision, Block C. - The plan as presented specified **18 townhome units** for the block. **Outcome:** - The Commission approved the development plan with conditions, including the explicit specification of 18 townhome units as part of the approved plan. *Note: The available structured data for this item is limited. Additional details regarding specific concerns raised, debate among commissioners, or further conditions attached to the approval are not reflected in the source material for this meeting.* ## AMENDMENT TO MANUFACTURED HOUSING REGULATIONS [timestamp: 3:18:13] The Commission took up Agenda Item 5, an ordinance addressing amendments to the jurisdiction's manufactured housing regulations. Daniel Crum presented the item, which centered on aligning local regulations with the requirements of House Bill 160. The discussion focused on bringing the existing manufactured housing rules into conformance with the state-level legislation established under House Bill 160. No significant concerns or opposing viewpoints are reflected in the available record of this agenda item. The Commission approved the amendment unanimously. --- ## Decisions - **PLN-MAR-25-00010** — postponed (9-0): Postponement of War Admiral Place, LLC zoning map amendment - **PLN-MAR-25-00013** — postponed (9-0): Postponement of Scotty Baesler zoning map amendment - **PLN-MAR-25-00014** — passed (8-2): Zone change for CS Acquisition Vehicle, LLC - **PLN-MJDP-25-00051** — passed (9-1): Development plan for Lyndhurst Subdivision, Block C - **PLN-ZOTA-25-00007** — passed (10-0): Amendment to manufactured housing regulations --- ## Full transcript You've got to be losing Well that was then, this is now And I want you back How many times can I say I'm sorry? How many times? 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Do we have any discussion or motion? Mr. Wilson. Mr. Chairman, move for a postponement of PLN MAR 25-13, Scotty Basler, and the associated development plan. Second. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Ms. Worth. Any discussion? Seeing none, we'll put that to a vote. All right. Mr. Pinn, could I trouble you for your vote? Thank you. And, Judy, you are in the affirmative. Thank you. All right. That carries unanimously. And just for the record, we also consent for the War Admiral Place. That already got postponed for one month. I appreciate it. All righty. Thanks, Nick. Okay. I believe that takes us, if there are no other postponements, Mr. Crum, are we good? All right. That takes us to page five, number three, CS Acquisition Vehicle, LLC. Good afternoon. Jeremy Young for Planning Staff. This is an application, PLN MAR 25-14, CS Acquisitions Vehicle, LLC. It is for a zone change request from R4, which is medium density residential, to a downtown frame business, B2A. Sorry, I got ahead of the slides there a little bit. So the property is just over two acres. It's from 251 to 273 East Maxwell Street on odd addresses only, and 256 to 271 Calmia. The applicant has indicated a downtown place type, high density residential development type, and they're seeking a zone change to construct a high density residential structure with internal parking garage. Just to give you an idea, the relative location of the site, the site is there in the center, and then there's High Street, Woodland Park area. Over here you've got Limestone, sort of to the west, northwest, Euclid Avenue here. And you can see this large area, that's University of Kentucky campus, and then the downtown area. So this is situated directly in a corridor between UK and downtown. As for the zoning in the adjacent properties, the brown area, which is to the north, and some areas here to the south, that's R4 zoning. It's medium density residential. The area here in the lighter brown with the hashed area, that's R3 zoning. That's planned neighborhood. And then the hashed area indicates an H1 historic overlay. And then this area here, that is a B2A downtown frame business, and you can see pockets of this dark reddish brown. And those are R5 high density residential. And the aerial imagery, that gives you a little bit better idea. You can see to the southeast, or the southwest there, UK's campus, a large parking area. You can see Memorial Coliseum. And then directly west you can see a portion of the UK Good Samaritan Hospital. Southeast of the subject property you can see the residential historic overlay area. And then you can see the area to the north here approaching downtown. So the property in question, the site is roughly 380 feet along Maxwell and Calmia Avenue, and about 310 feet along Rose and Stone Avenue. Rectangular in shape. All 12 properties do currently have structures. Most of those structures were built in the 20s. We've included with your packets a report from the Office of Historic Preservation assessment on all the structures that are currently on site. So here I'll just give you a brief overview. Certainly the Historic Preservation document will give you any kind of detail. I'm just going to give you a general overview of what's in the area. So the white structure there on the corner, that's currently the Sigma Kappa fraternity at 251 Maxwell. And then there's an adjacent structure that at one time appears to have been a single family that's converted into a multifamily structure. The stone property there on the left, it too was originally a single family dwelling that has been converted to a multifamily. And the property on the right, as well as the last two remaining on that block as you approach Rose, were also constructed as multifamily housing. And switching over to CalMEA, the property there on the left is a multifamily. It's unclear to me anyway. Maybe the Historic Preservation document can give you more insight. The structure on the right, what it was originally intended, but as with the other properties in the area, I would assume that it's multifamily student housing. And moving along, you can see another single family structure as well as approaching the corner of CalMEA and stone, more multifamily structures. And just to give you an idea of the pedestrian infrastructure that's present in the area, the first image there is the corner of Rose and Maxwell, and it's looking back, I guess upstream, so to speak, of Maxwell Avenue against the flow of traffic. So you can see the current condition of the pedestrian accommodations there. And the slide on the right is the same corner looking south along Rose there toward downtown. And the first slide here, that's the corner of CalMEA and Rose, and it is looking to the west. And the next slide, that is stone and CalMEA, and that's looking back toward Maxwell Avenue. So as for the application, the applicant is proposing to construct a high-density residential structure with internal parking, 322 units with 436 parking spaces and accommodation for 200 bike parking spaces. The structure will be varying between, I believe, 63 feet and 85 feet in height. And they have indicated a downtown place type, high-density residential, and the B2A zone, which are both recommended in the downtown place type. And as far as high-density residential, the comprehensive plan states that it's primarily high-rise multifamily units. It's located along transit routes that facilitate multimodal travel and access to open space opportunities using rooftops or plazas while still allowing for a high floor area ratio. And I'll just give you a brief overview of the design, and certainly the applicant can give you much more detail than I can. I'll just speak to more so the changes from the original design to the current. So this is the frontage along Maxwell. You can see, if I can get this to work here, there's a recessed plaza entryway there. The shaded area indicates inset from the other parts of the facade. These light wells were added in response to some articulation questions that were posed by staff. Initially the entrance was right on the corner of Rose and Maxwell, which is this area here, in response to some of the adjacent Aylesford neighborhood comments. The applicant moved it a little further down Maxwell, away from Rose. Additionally, and it's a little bit difficult to see in this slide, but you can see they've stepped the corner down a little bit. So I believe this is roughly 63 feet here, and then it extends back up to 85 feet. And along Rose, you can see the entire ground floor is lined by townhomes that have direct access to the sidewalk and outdoor patios. The recessed light wells, as well as the lowered maximum height there along Rose. This is Calamea Avenue. Originally the plan didn't have any townhomes along this frontage, which was one of the major concerns for staff in the original staff report. We felt that having more activity on the street was advantageous than overhaving just a blank wall that had no street activity whatsoever. And you can also see, maybe a little bit difficult, this is the entrance to the parking garage, so it's close to the corner of Calamea and Rose. And this is the Stone Avenue, and you can see townhomes here along this side as well. Those were added in response to some staff concerns. I believe this is the exit to the parking garage, and certainly the applicant can tell you which is which, but one of these is a delivery door and one is for trash. So they do have an internal compactor that will be accessed through there, and the trash removal will be facilitated through that door. And like I said, some of the original concerns with staff report, as well as some of the public comment, has been incorporated into an updated design. The design includes addressing the multifamily design standards, such as articulation, stepping down adjacent to the adjoining H1 overlay, adding the townhomes to activate the street for pedestrian activation. We received our report from the Office of Historic Preservation on the structures that are existing on the current property, and we were concerned with landscaping and tree preservation and mitigation on the site. The applicant has indicated that they intend to remove the existing trees, but they do plan to replace those with street trees. And staff recommends approval for the following reasons. The goals and objectives of increasing density, providing more housing units, incorporating changes to the massing of the scale adjacent to a residential area, as well as promoting multimodal transportation, biking, walking, and transit where it is in such close proximity to the university and downtown. It could render some vehicular trips unnecessary. And staff believes the proposal is in agreement with the policies of the comprehensive plan. It does meet the multifamily design standards in reference to the changing of the facade, the light wells, the articulation, those types of things that have been changed, as well as the activation of the streetscape, providing density along a downtown corridor is a recommended policy as well. And staff believes that it meets the development criteria of land use, transportation, environmental sustainability, and resiliency, site design and building form. And additionally, the applicant has offered the conditional zoning restrictions to prevent automobile sales, hotels, wholesale, minor automobile and truck repair, drive-through, adult entertainment, those types of things that wouldn't be appropriate along the Maxwell Corridor. And staff has added that we, should the Planning Commission approve this application, that the property should be developed with a minimum of 100 dwelling units per acre. And we feel that these are necessary restrictions to ensure the character of the Maxwell Street Corridor and allow residential uses and to increase residential density along arterial corridors. And if you have any questions about the zoning, I'd be happy to answer them. Thank you, Mr. Young. Do we have any questions for staff at this time? Mr. Nickel. Yes, I've got a question about kind of the evolution of the neighborhood that we've seen. It looks like it's a combination of single family residences that at some point were converted into multifamily residences, but the majority of the structures we were able to see were multifamily structures. So the question is, how many dwelling units currently exist on the site we are evaluating now? I don't have a total number of dwelling units that are currently on site now. It looks like, by my estimation, about five or six of those properties were originally single family and the other half were intended as, originally designed as multifamily structures. But to speculate on how many units there are currently, I don't have that information. Okay, but all of the units, all of the parcels that we're evaluating now are multifamily usage at this time? I believe so. Okay, thank you. All right, Mr. Mickler, please. I have a few questions, and I'm going to start with Commissioner Nichols asked my first one, so thank you. This is currently, you know, a block of multifamily housing, and it is, you know, it would be pertinent information to sort of evaluate that comparison. I've got a few, a couple questions for you, and then I've got a couple of follow-ups for the Historic Preservation Office as well. You talked about, in your report just now, the green space and sort of, and tree canopies, and the fact that there's a lot of tree loss. About what is the current tree canopy on this block? I don't have the exact figures. I do, I've spoken with the applicant, and if I'm not mistaken, I believe they said they intend to match that. Is that? Yes, they intend to match what's there existing with the street trees. The proposal is for street trees with the building with very low setback. I would be skeptical that that's feasible. I want to speak a little bit about the historic preservation part. Is there a representative here from historic preservation? Yes, there is. Good afternoon. I'm a member of the Historic Preservation Union, Betty Kerr, Director of Historic Preservation. We just received a report that sort of went through the individual houses, one by one. Sort of a thumbnail sketch, yes. But I wanted to ask you, because both in your letter and report, and in the letter from the State Historic Preservation Office, you all identified this block as unique, as a block, as part of this sort of 1920s apartment construction. I wondered if you could speak to a little bit more of that, and speak to, is this uniqueness of this 1920s apartment repeated in other places in town? Is it repeated in areas that are preserved? Could you speak to that? Well, when the whole southeast residential growth started to really boom at the turn of the century, this piece of it, it went both south by about three to four blocks of the downtown core, and then went flowing predominantly east. It constitutes a number of smaller neighborhoods that together make up what's referred to for the National Register nomination and designation report as the Southeast Lexington National Register area. You are aware this whole block and much of the area all around that are on the National Register of Historic Places put on in 1984. And so that document rather intensely addresses the significance of all of these blocks of residential architecture, and they're not entirely residential either. You get further east, there's some commercial scattered in. So the mix is part of the magic. In that, at that era, they were starting to respond to the mix, if you will, of almost town and gown, in the sense that there was known to be a need for apartments, but they were also intermingling those apartments with single family and duplex residential. So the real story is how they all work together, both visually, architecturally, streetscape, scene, setbacks from the street, block after block of these late 19th and predominantly early 20th century neighborhoods. So those are the kinds of factors. You notice all this block and its blocks around it, both to the south, to the north, to the east, west. Well, it was to the west. Reflect a similar mass and scale of the buildings. The architecture varies. That's part of very purposeful intent. But some are architect design, some are builder design, and so on. But what they are is a compilation that together has great significance. This is not a neighborhood where you pick out one building and say, well, there is one exception, the Pope House. The Pope House is on Grosvenor, a little further over, and it is by itself historically very significant. But the significance factor is totally driven by how all of this is a comprehensive and cohesive neighborhood and how it's representative of the development patterns of our community in the early 20th century in this particular block. And the fact that it demonstrates kind of for the first time a planned mix of apartments and single family and duplex. You do see that single family and duplex and apartment mix in some other historic areas of our community. They're all inside New Circle Road, for sure. And some of them are in Ashland Park. You'll see it, say, Sycamore. Sycamore in Ashland Park is more architecturally fourplex, multi-, four-unit building driven. Here on our block we're examining they're more interspersed architecturally. So you don't see a row of fourplexes all the way down. You see things with one-story porches and some have a gallery porch on the second floor, that sort of thing. And several of them you see read as a single family house in its architectural identity. But that's part of the intent and part of the development pattern. So when these areas were platted, you know, Maxwell Street is one of our major, both historically and I would say still today, one of our major identifier core streets in our downtown community. And when you arrive at it, at Versailles Road, slash Oliver Lewis Way, at the far end of Maxwell, and you travel it all the way east to High Street, each of these blocks, as you come along, purposely varies, no cookie-cut or anything. But more than that, it has a sense of place. And this block that we're talking about is an excellent example of that. And it has not been singled out to be listed on the National Register. It is inclusively in part of a bigger picture. And every time you lose part of that bigger picture, you are losing a great deal of the character of our community and the heritage of our community and places people love to live. So our role in historic preservation is to have done those technical reports and evaluations as an architectural historian and demonstrate how they meet these federal regulations for the designations, which those designations, once they obtain those, helps people get historic tax credits, brings with it the federal review processes of the impact of anything that's to be done if federal money is involved. And all that together rolls into part of what I believe strongly is important to be part of our planning for our community. Thank you, Ms. Kerr. Mr. McAleer. Thank you. I did, just as a quick follow-up with specifically to this block, I wondered if you could be very specific in elaborating what you meant by, you know, what you mean by, let me find it specifically here. Let's see here. Apologies here. But you said that this block differs, you say that this block is unique in Lexington. And I'm wondering if you could elaborate on that. And you say it differs from the blocks on either side. You say Lindhurst development differs from its immediate neighbors at Hagerman Court and Woolfolk subdivision. They're at different time periods. Lindhurst is of a different time period. And Hagerman is a different time period. And you have a lot of stuff behind it. So your development plats, you can follow those plats when you lay them out and you stand and study the architectural character of what was built initially through those plats on those properties. And you will actually, again, not with cookie cutter buildings, but with unified approach to the outcomes using a mix of materials, but they're all traditional style. And some of them got some Tudor influences and some have, of course, a lot of colonial revival and so on. But to experience it, you are experiencing an era's architecture story and your development pattern is apparent to the eye. And so the word unique is not to suggest one of a kind. And so rare that there is not other architecture reflective of similar styles. But there are not any of them used in any exact patterns and so forth. Again, those structures relationship to each other. As I say, I think looking at just one house or two houses is not what this is about. It is about looking at a collective neighborhood that continues to have very significant architectural integrity and historically is quite intact for reflecting what its intent was when it was built and as it has evolved in utilization through the years. So the fact that the neighborhood is there to tell its story, it's like when you tear out, well, we've just lost the block to the west and at least the front piece, the Maxwell. It's like knocking out the front teeth of my mouth. And so I can smile till the cows come home at you. And if I don't have my front teeth, you're not going to be real taken with me. I know that sounds silly, but it is what the impact of picking away at these neighborhoods and punching holes in them when they are significant and matter to our community's heritage, and I think matter for our future as well. They are part of what gives Lexington its charm, its character, its stories. And for every block you lose and every segment of blocks you lose, you're left with segments which don't have the story. The whole story has been negatively affected. Thank you. Thank you. Any other questions while I'm here? Just to clarify, if I'm understanding correctly, it's the role of your office to describe the neighborhood and its characteristics as historic or not historic, but it's beyond the role of your office to recommend a course of action. Is that correct? That's correct. We hope that the technical and factual information that we provide you is of help in your weighing your decisions, but of course, as staff in the Urban County Government, we do not have a role in recommending, at least not to you all. We have a role in recommending to some other boards. All right. Thank you, Ms. Worth. Do we have any other questions for Ms. Kerr at this time? Seeing none, thank you very much. Thank you. Do we have any other questions for Mr. Young? Yes, sir, Mr. Mickler. I had a follow-up for you in regards to some of these comments as this area with these historic apartments as one of the sort of original town and gown intersections that we've seen here in Lexington. And I know one thing that strikes me as a lifelong sort of resident of this area is that some of these apartment buildings are one of the places that students and non-students' lives have sort of intersected. I can think of someone involved in our business for many years who's lived in one of those apartments on this block. As you all sort of look at this as a staff, one of our comprehensive goals is to promote these missing middle apartment buildings, which are for the most part the exact size, and based on our comprehensive plan, diagrams of essentially what this block is composed of. We also are supposed to promote spaces in apartment buildings where different parts of our population intersect. And I was wondering if you could speak to, because it seems like that's a lot of what this block is made of, but while your staff report highlights that this would be increasing the housing available to students, I do fear that it would be decreasing the intersection between students in our neighborhood and it would be decreasing the availability of this missing middle housing, which appeals to a broader section of our community. Right. As far as the missing middle question, we do have bonuses and incentives to build more affordable housing that were recently implemented, and we've had some interest in it. We haven't had anybody take us up on it yet, but it's in the process of having those types of applications approved or brought before this body. So, I mean, there are avenues for creating that type of housing. Just to be clear, I didn't say affordable housing. I said sort of middle housing, which is defined as sort of the scale of the apartment complex, not the rent of the apartment complex or the apartment. Well, you know, as far as we evaluate what we're given, we don't, we're not the ones that come up with the plans. We more or less respond to what is submitted. So, you know, if someone were to submit those types of applications, certainly, you know, we would look upon them favorably, I would think, you know, if they met the criteria of the comprehensive plan. And remind me what the other part, the interaction between the neighborhood and the students, is that? Well, I'm speaking to the comprehensive plan, so it was the two elements of the comprehensive plan. The first element was the sort of speaking to the missing middle housing, which I would hope you would, as a staff, evaluate, because it is part of the comprehensive plan, and this proposal does remove a significant number of apartments that meet that definition. Right. I mean, well, you know, land use is, much of it is based on location, and this location, you know, happens to be right between the corridor, between UK and downtown. So that place type recommends more density and higher rise structures. So, you know, as staff, we felt that it did comply with the comprehensive plan in that regard. You know, as far as the interactions, I think that the way that this proposal activates all four sides of the street, I think, you know, would certainly encourage interaction, street interactions, widening sidewalk, those types of things would encourage pedestrian activity. So, you know, our hopes are that it would increase that type of activity. I think I was speaking to the sort of apartment types, but in regards to the specificity at which this project targets a much narrower group in our community, but thank you for your answer. I do actually have an answer on the tree canopy. It's currently at 26,819. The proposal calls for 25,500 square feet, so roughly 1,300 square feet difference. I mean, just to be clear, because we see these numbers all the time, that proposal is calling for trees planted in the sort of public easement as street trees along where all the power lines go and everything in the building, but is probably counting the full metric that they're allowed to count, even though they'll never be that large. Okay. Do we have any other questions for Mr. Young? Okay. Thank you, Jeremy. All right. I'll be presenting the associated development plan. With the requested zone change, MJDP 2551, subdivision of Lyndhurst. As was previously stated, this is in support of a zone change and depicts a multifamily residential structure in support of that from R4 to B2A. The applicant did submit revised plans on September 22nd and included a few of the things that we've asked for, some cleanup items. Under requirements not met, we still need to see the soil type and location on the tree inventory map, and then we added one thing that we asked them to show was the pedestrian entrances adjacent to, so this is a vehicular entrance off Cal Mea, so they've added a pedestrian entrance here and a bicycle entrance to the bicycle lockers, and then near the exit onto Stone, I believe right here is a pedestrian entrance, and I believe there's a pedestrian entrance on the other side that's sort of in line with that one. I've just asked the engineer to label those as well, so it's clear what type of entrances we have, so we've added that as a requirement not met. We don't identify or they have not requested any waivers at this time. Under design considerations, number one, consider create, oh, I apologize, you should have a revised staff report in your packet as well. Under design considerations on number one, consider creating a larger plaza space on the corner of Rose and Maxwell to accommodate more pedestrians. There is an anticipation of more pedestrian traffic with this and the other adjacent developments. Number two, continue Maxwell Street traffic calming bulb outs that were depicted on an adjacent project, the Maxwell, which is the block to plan left between Stone and Lexington. Traffic engineering has asked that they just continue those traffic bulb outs on this block as well. Number three, address sanitary sewer capacity. And then under plan questions and concerns, number one, discuss type and location in proximity to Rose Street of the garage entry system. There was a concern about queuing and stacking on CalMEA back to Rose Street to enter into the garage. And I believe the applicant can speak a little bit more to what they're doing to mitigate that. Number two, confirm use of an on-site compactor, and I believe they indicated that there will be an on-site compactor utilized. Number three, what is the proposal for storm water management? Number four, check existing and proposed layer management in CAD and cleanup plan. Number five, there is a known storm water concern on Maxwell Street. Clarify where the final site storm sewer will tie into existing system. Number six, how will the existing sanitary sewer system be accessed for the proposed development? Number seven, because these are multiple platted lots at this time, a consolidation plat will be required prior to construction if approved. And then finally, number eight, to discuss the place builder criteria. And in regards to the development plan, we are recommending approval at this time with the stated conditions and the following sign-offs. Number one, provided the Urban County Council approves the zone change. And then number two, Urban County engineers' acceptance of drainage, storm, sanitary sewers, and floodplain information. Number three, Urban County traffic engineers' approval of street cross-sections and access. Number four, Urban Foresters' approval of tree inventory map. Number five, Open Space Planners' approval of open space areas. Number six, Department of Environmental Quality's approval of environmentally sensitive areas. Number seven, U.S. Postal Service's approval of kiosk locations. Number eight, correct all noted deficiencies listed as requirements not met herein. And then finally, number nine, to denote the final development plan shall incorporate, A, townhome-style residential units along all four street frontages. These units shall feature direct first-level external pedestrian entrances and private patio areas. B, light wells along each side of the facade to break up the building massing. C, landscaping and trees between the structure and curb lines. D, use of various building materials and articulation. E, a step back in height from eight to six stories for the portions of the structure adjoining Rose Street. And F, mechanical areas shall be located internally or provided on rooftops. I did want to, should have done this before, point out a few things on the plan. They do indicate light wells along Calmea and Rose on this ground-level plan. And then they're also depicting two open-air courtyards down to the third level in the center of the structure with a deck on the eighth floor. And then along Maxwell, kind of in the center of the structure, they're showing an eighth-floor deck and pool amenity. And then, as I mentioned before, their primary entrance is off of Calmea with the exit being on to Stone. And then they're showing townhome access along the street frontage on this plan. And with that, I'll open it up if you all have any questions. Thank you, Chris. Do we have any commission questions regarding the development plan? Thank you very much. Mr. Groves? I believe we have some traffic impact study reports for you all to consider. James Mills, Transportation Staff. So I'm going to present to you the traffic impact study staff report for the hub on East Maxwell. First we look at the existing conditions. All the roadways in the area are 25 miles per hour or less. With that, East Maxwell Street, which is a one-way principal arterial, has an annual average daily traffic of 9,016 in 2022. That is down from its high of 13,700 in 2011. The same for East High Street. It kind of has decreased a little bit. It's another principal arterial, but it has decreased from 12,800 in 2007 to 12,037 in 2022. And our two collectors in the area, South Martin Luther King Boulevard and Rose Street, have both decreased significantly. South MLK has gone down from a high of 6,570 to 3,187. And Rose Street has gone down very significantly from 20,000 in 2001 to 5,634. So what this kind of shows us roadway-wise is that at best they've remained kind of stable. Or at worst, they've remained stable. And at best, they've gone slightly down. Looking at our multimodal options, transit service, there's substantive transit service in the area. LexTran has stops on East Maxwell, MLK, Rose Street, and East High Street that serve Routes 1, 3, and 51. And also Route 14, Route 16, and Route 27. One of these stops is located in the area of the subject properties. So next we take that and we look at the peak hour trip generation and distribution, which were estimates from the proposed and previously approved development plans through the ITE Trip Generation Manual, 11th edition. Specifically, the studies applied ITE Trip Code 226, which is for off-campus student apartments mid-rise. These trips were distributed to surrounding roadways for the full development year 2035 based on existing traffic patterns. And as you can see over here, we have our peak AM hour trip generation and the totals from these three developments and the PM entering and exiting peak hours. So we take that and we look at the peak hour level of service analysis of the existing street network, including East Maxwell Street, Rose Street, East High Street, MLK Boulevard. And these are all expected to experience low traffic impacts. Most intersections currently have an acceptable level of service of D or better during midday peak hours. This acceptable level of service is projected to continue in the future in 2035 development year. Right now the most impact is at the un-signalized intersection of Lexington Avenue with its intersection with East Maxwell Street, which will experience a little bit longer delays due to the afternoon peak hour. This is primarily due to traffic exiting Memorial Coliseum parking area, which adds to that traffic volume. The existing travel lanes on East Maxwell Street and East High Street can handle the traffic from the planned development. Both streets have two through lanes in each direction with shared turn lanes. So this kind of just shows where that main impact we're seeing over here in the peak PM hour at the intersections of East Maxwell and Lexington Avenue. Those turns due to it being an un-signalized intersection are the main reason why we're seeing that kind of delay for people having to wait to turn on to East Maxwell. Along East High, we actually see some improvement to just kind of maintaining that level of service. And then on Rose Street, it does relatively similar with only the turn at Rose Street having a little bit of an impact. So we also looked at the accident statistics and findings, a five year review of accident history from August 2020 to August 2025. On East Maxwell Street, there has been a total of 94 property damage only accidents, 19 injury accidents, and one fatal collision. The fatal accident, which occurred in January of 2022, was a result of a driver disregarding a traffic signal. The most common types of collisions in this area are angle collisions, side swipe direction, and rear end collisions. Overall, the accident rate on East Maxwell Street is higher than the statewide average for similar urban two-lane principal arterial roadways. And here shows where those accidents occur along East Maxwell Street. So with that, the findings and recommendations, the traffic impact study found that the existing roadway system is sufficient to accommodate traffic from the proposed land use. As noted previously, improvements to increased automobile capacity along the surrounding roadways and or at the intersections are not required or recommended. Such improvements would be difficult to implement and would likely result in minimal improvements for automobile level of service while significantly degrading conditions for bicyclists and pedestrians in the area. Staff, traffic engineering, and transportation planning does recommend the inclusion of traffic calming elements like bulb outs along Maxwell at the intersection in mid-block crossings where possible. Such improvements would facilitate safer biking and walking conditions and help reduce the accident rate. And with that, any questions on the traffic impact study? Thank you, James. Do we have any questions for Mr. Mills? Commissioner Molly Davis. Thank you, Chair. James, could you go back to the beginning of your report, please? I guess it's, sorry, existing conditions. So in some cases, the data point was during the pandemic when traffic would have been expected to have been lower because of the cessation of classes, going to online, change in how people operated. So with that in mind, I'm sorry, I'm trying to find the part where I had a question. It still looks as though East High Street and East Maxwell have a lot of traffic. And if we take that in conjunction with the thing that I heard from you, which is that East Maxwell has higher than the state average of accidents, and then in your further slides you say we're going to have a future level of service at C, D, or F. Is that a good way to proceed? When it comes to level of service, what that kind of means is the utilization of our roadway network. So in the peak hour, so whenever everyone, usually during the end of business, offices close, people are leaving. During that peak hour, what is that utilization looking like? So we are expecting for those roadways to be utilized by people to get from point A to point B. And so you're expecting a level of service where there is going to be a delay compared to whenever it's not at that peak hour. Okay. Well, with that in mind, I'm also referring to one of the citizen comments, which was they looked at Rose Street and that this would be an opportunity to, I guess, expand the right-of-way to increase the multimodal aspects of Rose Street and possibly of Maxwell. I don't know what study Mr. Leon refers to for Rose Street, moving from downtown to Alumni Commons, but is that something that you all are aware of? I can take that one. Mr. Leon provided that to the planning mailbox probably a month ago. It appears to be more of a student project report or an independent just evaluation as opposed to a plan that was adopted by the MPO. So James just switched to the MPO this week, so he probably was unaware of that information. But there is not an adopted transportation plan that would increase the right-of-way on Maxwell. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Do we have anything else for Mr. Mills? Thank you very much. Mr. Gross. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Brandon Gross on behalf of the applicant. And today we're going to break up our presentation a little bit. I'll start with a brief introduction and then representatives from CORE will give you kind of an overview of where we started and where we've landed over the last two or three months in our various meetings that we've had. So first off, I'd like to thank obviously you and the committees. You gave us feedback and comments and we adopted, I believe, some of those. We have met with the staff on several occasions to understand and respond to their reports they've given us. We've met with the neighborhood a couple of times to get their feedback also. I will say there are more people here today than there were if you add up both neighborhood meetings. And so we may hear new comments that were not brought to our attention previously. But overall, the staff has reviewed our materials and they have found that this project will comply with the goals, objectives, and design criteria of the comprehensive plan. They have also confirmed that our project conforms with the objective standards of our zoning work ordinance. Now, that is the bare minimum and fortunately CORE Spaces has been very responsive to the various feedback we have received. And so we have met with staff and we have adopted the staff's recommendations related to additional street level housing, expansions of the pedestrian facilities along Rose and Maxwell. We have adopted the bulb outs that traffic engineering has recommended. And so CORE started with the bare minimum and then they rose to the occasion and they have been agreeable to the recommendations of your planning staff. But fortunately, they wouldn't want to step further. We've had various meetings with the neighbors and we have adopted a number of requests that they made that were above and beyond what your planning staff has recommended for this project. And so this is a project that CORE Spaces wants to be here. CORE Spaces wants a development that Lexington can proudly say is here. This is not their first rodeo in our city. And ultimately they want to make a project that's right by you and by the community. And so what I'm going to do now is I'm going to confirm we have looked at the staff's revised reports regarding note number nine and we are agreeable to that. That can be added to the development plan in which we agree to the townhomes, the light wells and some of the other items that are above and beyond what's in the zoning ordinance. We have also reviewed the staff's recommendation for the conditional zoning and we are agreeable to also abide by that recommendation as set forth in your planning report. So with that being said, what I'm going to do now is I'm going to allow CORE Spaces to come up. They're going to give you an overview of once again where we started, then our interim plan, and then finally what our final plan looks like that we're presenting to you today. Because we've now gone through a couple... revisions related to staff, your, and the neighborhood comments. And so, with that being said, I'll let them come up, introduce themselves, and I'll walk through. And were we able to get that PDF loaded? Perfect. Unfortunately, the PowerPoint didn't work, so we're doing a PDF, so it won't be quite as nice on the illustrations, but they'll be able to walk you through it. Thank you. Hi, everybody. My name's Austin Pagnotta. Thank you for the opportunity to present today. It's good seeing some familiar faces again, and thanks for everybody coming out. We've really appreciated the community feedback we've gotten so far, and we hope that we've been able to incorporate it to the best of our ability and have addressed at least some of the concerns that the community has raised. As everybody here likely knows, Core Spaces has developed two projects in the market. One thing that's very unique about Core is we own those projects today. We are not here to develop, sell, and leave this market. We've been here since 2015, trying to work on those deals, find those deals, entitle, close, and develop Hub Upper and Hub Limestone. So we've been a part of the community for about 10 years, and personally, I've been here for the past five years, probably 30 to 40% of my year has been living in Lexington and working on this development opportunity that we've brought here today. So while this is the first couple months everybody here has seen it, this has been a long, long process behind the scenes to even just get to where we are today, and it's been roughly five years to get to a third site here for us in Lexington. So one thing we want to just point out, you know, there are limited areas to develop here in Lexington, and I'm sure everybody in this room is aware of that. There are limited opportunities for density in this market. There's historic overlays. There's high use, highest and best use on sites already. Development is extremely challenging, and building the right type of density is also extremely challenging, which is why it takes such a significant amount of effort, time, and energy just to get to the point of where we are today. Since we are long-term holders and investors, we are very committed to community engagement and feedback, and we really hope that was shown through this process. We're not here to do the bare minimum. We even published our first neighborhood meeting in the paper, which other developers may or may not do, but our approach was we want to get as many people out to these meetings as we physically could and continue that engagement through the process, because we know while we've been here for ten years, there's things we don't know and that the community can kind of help guide us on, and hopefully we can continue to incorporate that feedback. We did get tons of feedback, both positive and negative, on our development here, and again, we tried our best to incorporate what we could. I do want to address some specific comments that were brought up in our neighborhood meetings and that will likely be brought up today, because I think it is very critical that when we talk about things such as attainable housing and supply and demand and missing middle, the middle housing, I think it's very important we talk about the facts and what's currently going on in the market today. So Mr. Nickel and Mr. Mickler both asked a question on how many units are there today and kind of what's being used. So today, this has all been confirmed. This site is 12 houses, 50 units, and 80 beds. They average out to rent at $1,000 a bed per month. That's the average. The reason that price is so high is because some of those are one bedroom or one bedroom units or two bedroom units. So your price per unit actually gets skewed higher because you have less people renting that one unit. So $1,000 versus what we're proposing here, which will deliver almost 1,000 new beds. That's 12x the current density on site. One thing CORE really focuses on with our developments, and we did this at Hub Upper and Hub Limestone, is how can we create price sensitive options while not relying on any government subsidy? So CORE is a patented unit that we've designed over the past ten years that is at a $900 price point that is extremely attainable relative to even what's being leased today on site. In terms of percentage of beds on site, that's going to be 200 to 300 beds at that price point. That is 3x, 4x the density of what's there today, and just our price sensitive options that are more competitive than what's actually being leased there today. I think that's an extremely important point as we continue to talk about this site. Also, these are not hypothetical units. We have them at Hub Upper and Hub Limestone, like I said. And those units have been our best performing out of all of our offerings here. They were already 100% pre-leased for August of 2026. August of 2026, already for next year. In our opinion, by injecting this much needed supply, we're doing a few things. Number one, there's less competition for existing units. It offers the opportunity to stabilize rents, and it's opening the doors for lower income residents, students, and families at housing that would otherwise be occupied by people living at Hub Maxwell, is what we're calling it. Think of this product like a sponge. It will absorb the demand that can afford and wants to live in this product, and open up the more affordable supply for people who truly need it. This brings me to my final point. For the past year alone, I think everybody in this room knows that UK has added almost 3,000 students. There was a new article that just came out. They grew from 35 to 38,000 full-time undergrad students. With no significant housing supply coming online in that time period to absorb that influx of demand. Enrollment is projected to continue rising. And without action, we're setting up the students in the community for overcrowding, inflated rates, and instability. Our project directly counters this by providing high quality, purpose-built housing tailored to the market's demand. Think about our two projects in the market. I just said those specific unit types were 100% occupied. Those two properties are already 60% pre-leased for next year. That's over 1,000 beds, Hub Upper and Hub Limestone, already 60% pre-leased for next year. We've only opened our doors to new leasing in the past two weeks. We started leasing September 1st, that was when we opened the door to renewals, so people could stay. So they got the first look at those units. But to think that a market is this much ahead of where our national average is, which is 15% across 40,000 beds, that's our national average of pre-leasing at this time for next year. Lexington's 60%. Approving the development isn't just good for us, it's essential for Lexington. It's going to create jobs during construction, boost local business with the residents, and support the university's role as an economic engine. By increasing the supply, we're promoting affordability and reducing the strain on neighborhoods. And we're really excited to go through some of the changes in the specific design elements we've incorporated based on that neighborhood feedback that we've gathered over the past couple months. So I'm going to pass it to Olivia, who will walk through the presentation in a little bit more detail. Thank you. Okay, good afternoon. My name is Olivia Praise-Paprik. I'll be walking through the design as Austin had mentioned. Some of this will be a little bit repetitive to what staff has walked through, but I figured you'd hear it from us and we can kind of go through a little bit more detail. So we're all familiar with the site here. It is the full block here at Maxwell, Rose, Stone, and Kelmia. We just wanted to provide some current images of what is currently on the site today. You've already seen this again from staff earlier, so I'll kind of flow through these quickly. And we wanted to provide this. Again, we've made multiple iterations throughout the process here, so our unit counts and parking counts have fluctuated. We discussed it earlier that currently the plan that we have submitted shows 332 units, 1,010 beds, and 436 parking spaces. We wanted to touch on the parking spaces alone here in comparison to our other two properties in the market. This is approximately a 40 to 43% parking ratio, and that is based on market driven data here as a whole in Lexington, as well as at our current properties where there is a high demand for the parking. And so we're trying to provide a slightly higher parking here. And that's why we're proposing a one level underground of parking before we get up to grade where we'll provide at grade parking and one level above as well. We are also providing, as mentioned, 200 bike parking spaces. That was actually an increase from our last iteration that we shared with the neighborhood. After additional feedback, there seemed to be a higher desire for bike parking here. We wanted to provide that within the building where we could. So the required bike parking is 44, we are providing 200. So we kind of walked through some of the changes we've made. Along the way, we've had multiple meetings with staff. I believe we've had two more formal meetings, and we've had two formal neighborhood meetings, as well as sending out the latest entitlements package that actually got submitted to the city. We sent that to the neighbors as well, so they would have that in their hands prior to this planning commission. As my team has mentioned, we want this to be a collaborative process, and we're not trying to change anything without making them aware of it ahead of these meetings. So just to kind of walk through here, the changes we've made is including the light wells on all four streets prior. We only had it on three of the streets. We provide it on all four now, including the townhomes on all four streets. Again, only were on three prior, now on all four. Increasing the width of the sidewalk along Rose Street, adding that drop off and loading zone, and the traffic bulb outs at East Maxwell near the lobby entry. I'll walk through that a little bit more in the actual plans when we get there. And increasing the pedestrian facilities along East Maxwell Street. From the neighborhood, we had some additional feedback as well, including relocating the main entry further west in East Maxwell. This, we believe, was a little bit of a compromise between what was recommended by staff and the neighborhood. Although we felt as though we could move it a little bit further, this felt like the proper location given that the main pedestrian entrance across Maxwell into the campus is at that corner of Rose and Maxwell. And so by moving it slightly inward off of Maxwell provides that quieter entrance along Rose Street, or excuse me, quieter facade along Rose Street for the historical neighborhood. I'll kind of walk through the amenity deck and how we move that a little bit further in from Rose Street as well. Talked about the bike parking. A couple of other adjustments include adjusting some of the glazing of the townhomes at the base. We heard that it maybe provide a little bit better privacy both in looking in and out of the units. And so we've kind of raised the sill of a lot of the glazing down at the townhomes to provide a little bit more privacy there for those walking by. And we also included a step back that we did not previously provide at a lot of the building. That is at floors seven and eight. As mentioned by staff, that is at roughly 63 feet, and then the top of the building is at 85 feet. So providing some relief there. I just wanted to talk through here. You can kind of see where the bulb outs are at the main entry along Maxwell. That currently provides a two and a half car length loading zone. This is more for a short term loading or drop off area for Ubers, Lyfts, Uber Eats and the like. We also are providing an internal loading area, which I'll get to on the next slide, along Stone Avenue, which is more for your long-term deliveries for Amazon, UPS, USPS, and that. Just wanted to clarify again, we do have light walls along all four sides here. They vary in depth and width, just to provide some variation, but that way there is some relief in the actual architecture, as well as the variation of materials that we'll get through. You can see the amount of trees that we are providing around the perimeter of the building here, as well. So just to talk through the first floor plan here, everything that's kind of in that blue color, those are all the townhomes. And you can see, let's see if I can figure out how to use this, you can see some of the entrances here. So we are providing pedestrian entrances all along the facade. This blow up on the right hand side just kind of shows that we're providing a slight recess at those entrances to really hone in on that residential feel. And have kind of your more residential stoops and porches at the front of it, really trying to fit in with the context of the other homes around the area. And then down here is that loading area that we spoke about off of Stone Avenue. So that's actually something that is a lesson learned, not only from our properties here in town, but just around the country, that having something that's a loading within the building versus external is really helpful to our delivery system, especially in the first couple weeks of move in for student housing. There tends to be a lot of deliveries, and we want to make sure we can mitigate that as much as possible. Staff also spoke about how we wanted to talk about the garage entry itself. We typically provide a transponder to our residents, especially in a parking garage of this size, that allows for a quick release of that door to help mitigate any queuing along the street. And we also brought that entrance in per code to make it sure that it is also within our property line. So any queuing of about a car length or so would be on our property and not within the street itself. These are the images that were both provided to the neighbors as well as staff as part of our submittal. This is along east to Maxwell here, so you can kind of see that bulb out down here right in front of our lobby. That's right just off of the corner, really making sure that anything along rows is a little bit quieter, a little softer of an architecture. You can see along the base here, we are providing a datum line of the divide from the structure above to what you actually see at the pedestrian level. And we'll see some zoom ins of the townhomes and pedestrian level in a moment here. But just wanted to highlight that here as well as the light wells on either side of this kind of central massing. This is the rendering along Rose Street. I think this is really important to share because this has the deepest light wells that we are providing, again, to really provide that relief here. So not only are we providing relief at the base where the townhomes themselves step in a little bit at the entrance, then there is a relief at the light wells where there is a depth change as well as a width change. And again, we have that change up on the seventh floor for that setback, which is the newest addition to our massing here. We also wanted to highlight that along the pedestrian level here, we have all of our residential entrances. So we're really trying to highlight and make sure the scale of those walking on Rose Street really feel that perception at grade of what they're looking at really feels like a townhome residential feel. And that the apartments themselves are kind of above their eye level, so what they're experiencing at grade is truly residential. Here's a zoom in here of the townhomes themselves and our iteration of the design currently. I'll get into a little bit of how we got to this, there's a detailing here. But again, just wanted to provide this image of a zoom in just to really showcase how these are a change in scale of the building itself. And we feel as though help transition to that pedestrian level along the street frontages, especially on the three residential streets. These are the same elevations that staff showed earlier. We just clarified a little bit in our latest submittal to show where that relief is. That is why some of these areas are a little bit more grayed out. That kind of shows where any of the setbacks actually would be and really clarify what's in the forefront versus what's in the background itself. Similar here in Kelmia and Stone. And then lastly, the one thing we wanted to touch on is we are aware that we are in an area that there is contextual architecture that is of importance to Lexington. And we want to make sure that we're incorporating some of that design into the new build itself. These are not on our site in particular. These are more contextual around us. But just again, paying attention to the neighborhood as a whole and not just the structures that are currently on site. But one of the things that we've mentioned in our previous presentations, for those who were in attendance at both staff level and neighborhood, is that we talked about some of the buildings on site and being able to try to either reuse the materials or pay homage to the design itself by recreating them in a more modern take. Not necessarily mimicking them, but recreating them. And so the list here on the side kind of lists the pieces that we found to be some areas that we can actually reuse the materials or incorporate into our townhome design itself. Including the limestone sills, the ornamental headers, colonial light styled lights, red brick blends, window muttons, curved door with the muttons, limestone base, white wood panels, Juliet balconies, and stone coping details. So we tried to incorporate these into the townhomes themselves. And it's actually something we've done elsewhere in some of our other developments. One in particular is actually at a property up in Madison, Wisconsin, which we spoke about at a previous presentation. Where we were able to work with a lot of our contractors and take down some of those pieces and reuse them in a manner within the building that we feel is paying respect to the design and utilizing them in a more modern way. But that way we're not just demoing the building as a whole. So here on that same image of the townhomes, we're kind of showing where we're able to implement them. Again, this is kind of our latest pass of how we are implementing that contextual design into the townhomes themselves. The plan here is to reuse as much of the material as we can around all of the facades of the building. So we're not just focusing on one facade or the other. And where we are not able to use the same materials in the buildings, obviously because the facade length is going to be greater than what is currently there. We would kind of take a more modern approach to it, so that it's again playing homage to it versus trying to replicate what is there on site. We felt this was really important. Again, we know we're coming into an area that has some level of design already around it. And we wanted to make sure we're not just ignoring that and bringing that into the design here. So overall, as my team has mentioned, we feel as though we've made some significant changes to the building and to the design itself that we actually are very happy with. I think it actually ended up bettering the project. And I feel as though this latest iteration that we've submitted is kind of the best one yet. And I would like to open it up to any questions or anything like that to our team. Thank you very much. Do we have any questions for the applicant at this point? Sure, Commissioner Molly Davis. Thank you, Chair. Hi, thanks for your presentation. I wondered if you had done any shade or shadow studies to show the shadow that the building casts on all sides, say, at the three points of the year, that people often ask about how much shadow are we going to have on our neighboring properties? Yes, we did. Did we send that to staff? Okay, I can kind of talk through it a little bit, but we did do a study. Let's go back to this site here. So given the fact that our site is actually on an angle, you're not going to get kind of that true shadow on one street or the other for like a south facing study, right? So what we looked at is where the sun is mostly going to push. And so most of your shadow is going to go this way, as most people are aware. In those shade studies, the majority of the shadow actually just touched over the street itself in both the bi-right and our scheme. So there's not much difference between the 60 foot and the 85 foot scheme here. Okay, Mr. Wilson. First of all, I applaud you for the activities of trying to get in contact with the community. The public engagement piece for us is very important. I was just curious on a number, how would you rate the representation from the community? Did you have a good number or a fair number? Yeah, I would say we had a good amount at each. The first meeting probably had the larger turnout, just because they were probably the most interested in it. But yeah, I would say we had pretty good engagement. And even after some of our meetings with staff or some of our previous presentations, there were some neighborhood members who were in attendance of those, and we spoke to them afterwards as well. So I would say we had a pretty good engagement with them back and forth. Mr. McClure. When you all speak about the like units that you sort of hit that lower price point. What's the typical square footage of a unit like that? Yeah, so it varies widely. They go anywhere from 950 to 1250 square feet. Sometimes upwards of 1350 square feet. Like for multiple bedrooms? Yes, that is correct. Yep, so it would be, the bedroom sizes would be the same as all of our units. It's just the more people you put in there, the less square foot per occupant you usually have, which is how we're able to get to such an attainable price point. And we have a very diverse unit mix here. We have studios, one bedrooms, two bedrooms, and then our more price sensitive options. So usually what we see at our sites, and we just did a demographic study, usually we see a balance of like 10% maybe younger professionals market rate, maybe recent grads, and then 90% students. But in a location like this for downtown, I think we're expecting a little bit higher percentage of market rate. And that's why we're tailoring a little bit more studios and one bedrooms and two bedrooms to this unit mix. And then for the actual price sensitive side, the more student focused side, one thing we've really looked at across our entire portfolio is, okay, what's the best option to get to the price point lower? And we've done probably over ten years, probably hundreds of surveys on how to best accommodate this lower price point unit. And what we found is doing these, we call them 4-2 lights. They're pretty much a smaller version of a traditional four bedroom, four bathroom. You take out two bathrooms, you're able to save a lot on cost, and you're able to get price down. From a student's perspective, they might be coming from a dorm where they're sharing a shower with 15 people on their floor. So sharing a bathroom with one other person at a much reduced rate than what can actually be offered in the market and is more comparable to maybe a house, like a four bedroom, one bathroom house or whatever it is. We found is a very unique way that CORE is able to get price point down and really address that price sensitivity. So what we've seen across our portfolio is these specific units, and we have the data we can send this across. Least 30% of all of our beds, roughly across our 40,000 beds, usually they're the first to lease. So our study last year for August 2025 showed that these units leased by October to 100% capacity on a very large sample size. And we've been getting continued feedback that students love those types of units because of the price point, and they don't mind sharing the extra bathroom. Thank you. You're welcome. Mr. Pim. Yeah, while I have you there, you stated earlier that CORE intends to own this building. Yes, sir. It's not going to be a reed or something else like that. Do you intend to own it as long as depreciation, 20 or 30 years? We will own it as long as we're able to. Yeah, so we still own our two assets in the market, and we have no plan. As long as we're around as a company, our business plan is to own them. All right, let me do a follow-up question. Of the units you have, the townhouse units, will they be rented by students, or will they be a market rate for anybody? Yeah, so we're trying to thoughtfully think through that actual unit mix in those townhouses. because if we make them four bedrooms, which right now they're currently drawn as four bedrooms, it's going to attract more of the student demographic. So we're trying to put a little bit more diversification in those townhomes so we don't restrict any leasing on any of our units, so technically they can be rented by anybody. But when you have the four bedrooms in there, it becomes harder for a market rate renter to get that unit. So we're trying to create a little bit more unit diversification within those townhomes. So it's basically a student housing operation? Yeah. Thank you. Okay, seeing no other commissioner questions for the applicant at this time. Thank you very much. Thank you. Mr. Grose. Thank you very much. As the core team has discussed, they took to heart the comments from the various stakeholders. I think one thing to keep in mind is that we're kind of writing a new story for the city with this project. In 1860s, when that big manor was built on five acres, that was a story for the 1860s. And then 60 years later, do you mind if I proceed? That's an error. And then 60 years later in the 1920s, when our population was 55,000 people in Lexington, they built these buildings. And those buildings were that story to solve the problems of that era. And now we are 100 years later, and buildings that were built in a city for 55,000 people aren't going to house a city with 325,000 people. And that's just the reality. And if we want to build up and not out, these are the type of efficient projects that we need to proceed with. I don't want to expand the urban service boundary. I supported it because we needed more housing. Because since the 1990s, we've essentially built low and medium density housing throughout our city. Now I've been pleased to see, over the last five years, we have started to build up more often. But we still have the same problems. Nobody wants up next to them. It's always somebody else's problem. It's never your problem. And that's just not how this community is. We will all be asked to make sacrifices as we write our story for today and for tomorrow. That's what this project is about. That's what the comprehensive plan is about. It's about efficient use of our property. This project is going to net about 900 people will be able to live in this project versus the 80 that live here today. We'll do the math on that. That's 2% of our 14,000 unit gap that we have for rental properties in Lexington, 2% being solved on two acres. I'm not saying we build this project every single place that there's a piece of land in Lexington. But these are the type of projects that will help us close that gap. And when it's appropriate, especially when we have tried for decades to connect downtown to the University of Kentucky, that we have made a conscious decision not to protect these buildings with an H1 overlay. And that we have told the marketplace and these owners, these are areas in which you can redevelop. It's not just infill. Our primary goal is infill and redevelopment. All the easy stuff's gone. We've torn down all the tobacco warehouses that were no longer needed and built housing. There's not a lot of infill projects left. I think you heard that from our affordable housing developers last week. Everyone is scrambling for what is vacant and what is available. Unfortunately, this land cost would prohibit any of those affordable housing projects to locate here. But a market rate can come in here. There are lots of benefits to our community for a project like this. Number one, if you drive by there, you will notice that there's parking lots where the backyards used to be. All the backyards in these houses are more or less parking lots. We're going to get rid of all that surface parking. And we're going to use that land that is currently used for parking for new housing in this community that is desperately needed. I've done some quick back of the napkin math. Currently, what these properties are generating in real estate taxes for the community versus what the hub is paying on South Upper. Year one this is built, we'll probably see $500,000 more in tax revenue coming into our community when this is built. Another direct benefit. Once again, we're going to get 300 new units. Closing our desperately needed rental gap. Direct benefit for this community. I'm not going to go on about the sponginess of a project like this. I think you all realize that if we build housing for 900 new people, they're going to come from somewhere. And you know where they're going to come? They're going to come from the existing neighborhoods. They'll be attracted to this spot. They're going to come from the apartment buildings out Taste Creek Road, where they have to commute every day to UK. They're going to be attracted to these types of spots. Now, not everyone's going to like this. Personally, I'll probably never live in one of these. I like old, lead infested asbestos homes. I've always lived in them. I probably always will live in them. That's just my personal taste. I personally like older structures. But there are lots of people who want modern living. They want efficiencies. They want safety codes. They want all that stuff that comes with a modern house versus what comes with an older structure. 900 new people to this area. And I think what people fail to realize is, students are us decades ago. Students are our children today and our grandchildren tomorrow. They're not a subspecies. They are residents in our community. They are our neighbors. That's what they are. We would not treat any other group. We would not talk about any other group in our community like we talk about students. They're our brothers and sisters. They deserve somewhere to live just as much as you and I do. And this is an opportunity to allow them to live in an area in which they want to live, in which this community has said, we want you to live. That's what we're asking here for this project. And those students, guess what? They're going to be transit riders that LexTran needs. More riders is going to equal better service. We're not going to be able to buy our way out of better service for LexTran. They need riders. Those 900 people are going to need goods. They're going to need services. They're going to patron existing businesses. They're going to provide revenue for new businesses. I work downtown every day. It's a ghost town except for lunch, dinner, and entertainment time. People say, I want a grocery store down here. Wouldn't it be nice if we had a pharmacy? Think about this, think about that. Well, you know how you get those things, people? You get those things by people living where you want those things. You don't get those things by having a downtown core that we have that is only for the government, lawyers, accountants. That's it. And then the entertainment. So you get the bars. But we don't have livability in our downtown. We don't have lives. We don't have stories downtown. Not how we want them. We do have some. But that's why Nashville builds downtown. That's why Indianapolis builds downtown. All these cities I go to, they have high rises downtown. But we don't. And that's what we need to change. That's what we need to change to make our story. A new story. A future story for our citizens. And that's what I'm asking you to do today. I think the staff has eloquently put in the report that we comply with the comprehensive plan. I think we have demonstrated that compliance. I believe that we comply with all the objective standards. We have worked with the staff and you and the neighbors to go above and beyond what is required from the objective standards. And I think we have put together a project that I'm proud of. And I think the city will be proud of once it's built. Now, for those of you who were on this board back when the Hub Upper was being done, you'll remember that that project was going to destroy the South Hill neighborhood. It would never be the same. And yet here we are. Six, seven years later. South Hill neighborhood is still there. The neighbors like shopping at the Target. Shopping at the Target. Change is hard. And I get that. And I understand that. And we just have to embrace it. If we want to build towards what our comprehensive plan says we want to build towards. Thank you. I'm here for questions. All right, Brandon. Thank you. Do we have any questions for Brandon? Seeing none, thank you very much. Thank you very much. Before we move on to public comment, I want to just let the commissioners know that we have the public comment that was emailed to us earlier this week in our Granicus, including the letter from Mr. Potts. And then we do have additional comment that came in as late as I think earlier today that staff has uploaded for us to consider. At this time, we will hear from the public. It is the policy of the planning commission that everyone gets three minutes of time. You approach the podium, state your name, and then share your thoughts with us. We do not allow the lending of time. Is there anyone from the public who would like to speak on this application? Yes, please. If you would, just feel free to approach the podium. If we could form a queue, it can maybe move a little more efficiently. Hello? State your name and address. Got it. Hello, my name is Brayden Semper. And you said address, right? Yep. I live in- Hold on, I'm sorry. Pardon me for one moment. I'm sorry, just for fire safety, let's keep the line to maybe three or four people at a time. Thank you. Sorry, please go ahead. All right. My name is Brayden Semper. I live at 258 East High Street. And it's exactly like two blocks away from the proposed development. The approved departments that are next to this one, one of them's been under construction for a little bit. I live two blocks away, and I haven't noticed any severe disruptions or anything. Really, there haven't been any cons to my life living so close to those developments. And the noise from construction is always temporary. It's never really at night. Honestly, the worst noise is just from loud cars driving by. It's way worse than any construction could be. And I'm just fully in support of the development. Building more of the market rate apartments would take a- it'll bring people who would be living in other places that other Lexington residents can now live in since those people have moved out. And if we want to eventually build the 10,000, 20,000 new units that we need in Lexington, we have to say yes to high rises that would actually allow us to build that many. This is just a perfect example. It's right next to UK. So all the students that will be living there, they'll be commuting just down the street to UK. It's a super quick walk. It's like 10 minutes at all. It's just 10 minutes. And honestly, if I could change development, I would reduce the amount of parking that the development has. I think it would lessen the amount of traffic. It would save money and space in the building if we had less parking spots in that development. And the majority of the people living there will be just commuting to UK. So I don't think there'll be a whole lot in need for all that parking. And that's about all I had. Thank you. I yield my time. Thank you. Hi. My name is Catherine Pence. I'm a resident of 344 East High Street, where there is only one lane currently. And I do not believe that this development represents Aylesford or Lexington as a whole at all. It displaces 80 people whose home is there. And do we play the game of do 80 lives matter over the theoretical lives of 900 people who might move in? I think it is interesting that they are saying they reached out to the neighborhood because I was never contacted. I never received anything. I never saw anything. And frankly, I don't know anyone who reads the paper who is my age. And that seems to be a concern for me. In addition, I think that the traffic is bad enough in this area. It is so congested every single day. I walk to school because the traffic is so bad getting back from school. And having a high rise here is just going to exacerbate that problem. In addition, I am a historic preservation student at the University of Kentucky. These are excellent examples of Lexington's unique historic architecture. I think it would be irresponsible to tear them down to put in a cookie cutter and, frankly, ugly design that you can find in every city where they are trying to gentrify neighborhoods. Also, these apartments will not be affordable, and they will not be quality. Because I have many friends who have lived at the hub, and they have had horrible experiences with insects, with leaks, with maintenance problems not being taken care of. The landlords do not care about students. My landlords are a couple that graduated from UK decades ago. They are retired, and this is their source of income. And they are always ready when I need them. I had a maintenance request. It was finished by noon the next day. So this is the kind of person that owns these houses that they want to tear down. It's independent people, Lexingtonians, people who know and understand the city and the neighborhood, and who this is like one of their only sources of income, possibly. I think that it is threatening the integrity of Lexington as a historic city. It is threatening the integrity of Aylesford as a historic district. It is displacing families, people who live there, people whose homes are there, people who love it there, like I do. I love where I live. And also, I think that it's just not what this city represents, and it's not what this neighborhood wants. We do not want a cookie cutter building destroying our view of the skyline and destroying our historic neighborhoods and our affordable homes. So I hope that you can take these into consideration as someone who's an Aylesford resident right now, who is a student, the target audience for these people, and someone who loves where they live and loves Lexington. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Hello. My name is Elena Grace Broderson. Most folks know me as Gray. And I actually don't live in the Aylesford area, but I grew up and spent the majority of my life in Lexington. Though I haven't been around the past few years, I moved back last year as I had been pursuing a career in international development. I was in the Peace Corps. I served as a community and economic development volunteer. And then I most recently was a Rotary International Scholar in Japan, where I received my Master's in Social and Cultural Analysis. I say all of this to let you know that I have lived and worked around the world in the development sector and have seen many different approaches to development, both too much success and too much failure. The least successful methods of development I have seen are often short-sighted and only interested in an immediate and often theoretical economic prosperity for a very particular group. The most successful developments that I have seen bring a holistic approach. They take ideas that incorporate ecologic and human development with a community-centered economic framework. I believe the proposed development is unfortunately a part of the first category and vehemently opposed to the rezoning of this area. Our notion of development in this area has historically put people over profits, prioritizing private financial interests, and often leaving the community out in the cold, sometimes very literally. The trend of tearing down anything old so we can build new is wasteful and disrespects the integrity of historical buildings and all that have worked on them throughout history. It takes away from the story of our city. Often we learn the most from reflecting on our past. How will we continue to learn from our history if we are tearing it down? Currently, I work out at Shaker Village in historical preservation. I'm steeped in the incredible Kentucky architecture that we have, and every day I am reminded how vitally important it is to preserve and advocate for the preservation of our past because it informs how we move into the future. I can't help but notice all of the 250 Lex signs everywhere all over the city, including downstairs. I'm so proud to be part of a city that celebrates our history and our legacy. And it's a shame that developers are trying to charm our city into demolishing so much of what makes us unique. Please listen to your citizens, listen to your communities. Listen when we say we do not need more new developments proposing unaffordable housing and crowding an already overcrowded area. We need to bolster the infrastructure we already have. We need to find creative pre-existing solutions to the affordable housing crisis. And we need to enrich our entire community instead of focusing on developments that will only be beneficial for a small fraction of a population. If we want to be celebrating the rich history of Lexington in another 250 years, please join me in opposing this rezoning so we will still have history to celebrate. Thank you for your time. Thank you. If we could please hold our reactions. The Planning Commission wants to listen to everybody in an efficient manner. Thank you. Hi there, Wendy McAllister. I've lived at 225 Stone Avenue for almost 30 years since I went to UK. And I also owned a fourplex on Stone. And kind of always felt like Stone Avenue was like a special part of Lexington that nobody kind of knew was there. And unfortunately, they're finding it in bad ways. So I wanted to talk about the traffic impact. And how I think too much is too much, no matter how nice the applicant is. I think that if you go and look at our traffic, in 2023, there was a study that said we had the worst traffic in Kentucky. And that we were 64th in the nation. A 2025 study said that per capita, we are third in the nation for fatalities. So, you've just approved the Stavrov development next door. But sort of blacked out the traffic impact of that. And then, I frankly think that that one was underserved in terms of parking and deliveries. So that parking on Stone Avenue in Maxwell becomes more precious. There's no traffic study on Stone Avenue. But both this development and the Stavron development rely on Stone Avenue as an exit for their buildings. And the only way to get to High Street is to zip yourself down Stone Avenue. So, the idea that they're going to go out of this and onto Maxwell Street because they're trying to keep the traffic off of Maxwell Street is wrong. So I've lived there. Let me tell you what Stone Avenue looks like for having lived there for 30 years. Both ends of Stone Avenue are blind corners. On Maxwell Street, you can't see oncoming traffic due to the on-street parking. On High Street, there's a parking lot there. And if somebody parks there, you can't see oncoming traffic due to the parking. So, it's dangerous and it's also narrow. So, you can't, two cars can't pass each other without feeling like you're going to clip your mirrors. You can't back out of your driveway without feeling like you might hit somebody. And you also have to jockey yourself around to actually be able to go forward. I owned a fourplex for 15 years on Stone Avenue. And had four apartments, two bedrooms. And how many cars I had parked in the back? Six to eight. The average students, three or four students have vehicles. These vehicles have to go somewhere. So, we've already gone to this one that's like 100 parking spaces for like 500 units or something. So I commend them for understanding that they need the parking that they need, but we're already underserved. So, I think you got the gist of this. I don't think you guys really thought through how the traffic impact really looks on this. Thank you. Thank you. Good afternoon. Thank you for what you do. My name is Richard Shine. I'm a geography professor and the board president of the Blue Grass Trust for Historic Preservation. I was also on the mayor's 2020 task force on housing and gentrification and helped write that report. I'm going to read my comments because I know what happens when I get behind a lectern. In general, I support Lexington's need for density, urban infill, and affordable housing. I actually like the project built a few years ago at the corner of Pine and Upper Street. It does not seem to overpower the neighborhood, but I can't say the same about this proposed project and its accompanying zone change. I have two points to make. First, I find it, and we've heard this several times today, but I'll be quick. I find it ironic that the proposed development will wipe out a neighborhood of exactly what most cities in the country are trying to recreate today. A neighborhood of what generally is called the missing middle. The neighborhood's 100 year old multi-unit buildings were well designed and solidly built and created a diverse urban neighborhood with an easy walking distance of the urban core. All accommodated by an R4 zone. Who knows what B2 will bring down the road? That is not what this development will do. Second, I worry about what has been called a crisis by design, nationally linked to purpose built student accommodation. The crisis is student debt. In large public universities like UK, students often are forced to budget more for housing these days than for tuition and fees. A recent University of California study notes that students often can only afford to live in these luxury accommodations through loans, creating a debt driven housing market, and one that doesn't build equity. And we know what those kinds of housing markets do. This financialization of student housing is driven by national and international players, is purely market driven with little consideration often for the people and places that are targeted. And the target cities, I can't help but notice, often are in the south, which have more permissive real estate environments, including planning and zoning requirements that are often more accommodating than other parts of the US. Ultimately, we will pay the opportunity cost that these developments present for providing truly affordable housing in our city and lose one more significant historical neighborhood. When there are many other parts of the city that might be more appropriate to development at this scale, if not for student housing. Thank you. Thank you. Hello there. My name's Rhett Constantine. I appreciate your time today. I'm the owner at Old School Coffee, and I'd like to speak about the hub's involvement with my business. Throughout the years, I'm located in the South Hill neighborhood. Dudley Square is our flagship location. We've expanded to a few more since then. But when the hub came in, my business was brand new. It was my first year of business. A representative approached me and said, hey, your coffee shop's the closest one to this development. And they have been distributing marketing material for free, every single move in for my small business. No other apartment complex has extended that to me. No other development has extended that to me, a small business owner. Even the University of Kentucky, I'm a proud alumni myself. There's been no push to help my small business with the incoming residents like I've seen at the hub. When they developed the new one there in Virginia, they reached out to me. They've even got another coffee shop in the building, and they still said, hey, do you want us to do this marketing material for you? I decided against that, because I wanted to show respect to the other coffee shop on the first floor there. But that's what I wanted to speak about, was that direct community involvement. I'm glad it's right there. Those students, I see the buy one, get one free cards that I distribute come back more than any other marketing thing that I do, because it's a close walking distance. This new proposed development is going to be just as close. These 900 beds, I hope they continue to do that for me. That's going to bring great, it's going to impact my business tremendously. I'd like to add one other thing outside of that. I've had a very different experience with the hub than that young lady who spoke before me. I've had friends that have chose to renew there. I've never heard those type of complaints. Maybe they're different, I don't exactly know. But when I go there to do my marketing material, I set up in the lobby. That is a very clean, very nice lobby. I would rather be there than anywhere else. I've been in some other, I'm not going to name any names, some other apartment buildings, student living. And from, again, I haven't been in the rooms, but from what I can see, they're very well put together, very clean and very professional. And they've been nothing but supportive to my small business. This growth is happening, whether we like it or not. And as a business owner in this town, I am for this growth. I am for this in this area. This is where people want to be. The University of Kentucky is certainly not slowing down with their expansion. I lived on Con Terrace when I was a student. That whole area is totally unrecognizable. The university didn't say, hey, how should we do this? Should we make it look like it used to look? Nothing. They just gutted it all. And at least these folks are trying. I mean, we have to have more room for folks. But again, I just want to mention those couple things. And again, the main thing is the impact on my small business. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Good afternoon. My name is Zach Leonard. I'm the Historic Preservation Manager at the Blue Grass Trust. And I've come before this commission twice before to oppose the Maxwell and subtext complexes on the same street, albeit for different reasons. Today, I want to make two arguments. Firstly, we need to consider this project in relation to these other developments that will radically reshape Aylesford in their own right. There's been a massive outcry against this hub, and that's because Lexingtonians are now seeing the effects of these planning decisions and the obliteration of a large chunk of a national register listed neighborhood. Secondly, I want to highlight the unique aspects of this project area. Unlike the properties in East Maxwell that have already been destroyed, the buildings here represent some of the city's earliest purpose-built multi-family housing. In some cases, these were owner-occupied duplexes, such as the Craftsman. That's Sam Biderman, a Jewish shoe salesman from Kiev, constructed in 1924 at 256 Calmia. You also have denser housing stocks, such as 273 East Maxwell, a rare example of an Italian Renaissance Revival apartment building. The vast majority of these 12 properties retain their integrity and are historic tax credit eligible. And the developers have argued that these buildings are not historic or not historic enough, despite being listed on the national register. And we've also heard that they lack significance because they are not individually designated and not placed in the H1 overlay. Both of these arguments are factually incorrect, and I see that you've all received a letter from Craig Potts, our State Historic Preservation Officer, that emphasizes the existence of many important historic assets in Lexington that lie outside of H1 overlays. Moreover, that letter states that this site contains a high concentration of early multi-family housing that importantly reflects Lexington's urban evolution. This project area directly borders an H1 district, and per the stipulations of the comp plan, it should be treated as a transitional zone that reflects the existing urban form. An eight story cube with a shallow step back to six stories on rows hardly respects the historic nature of the neighborhood. Moreover, it fails to provide UK students with a variety of housing options, since the Maxwell and subtext projects are catering to the exact same wealthy demographic. I've heard personally from renters in the project area who currently pay $1,500 per month for a two bedroom unit. Core spaces would rent one bedroom units for $1,700. And that jump is prohibitive for many students and completely undermines the pledges in the comp plan to support affordable housing. To conclude, these buildings are significant according to the Kentucky Heritage Council. They are already densely grouped, and they serve a large sector of the student population that the hub, the Maxwell, and subtext will not accommodate. What we're seeing here is not community development, but rather an attempt by an out of state private equity company to expand its portfolio. To quote the chief investment officer at Core Spaces, student housing remains an increasingly attractive asset class for private wealth. Thank you for your time and attention. Thank you. The members of the public who are going to speak who are standing, we will hear from you. And then after that, since we're going on two hours, we'll take a ten minute recess. Please go ahead. Thank you. Excuse me if I speak quick, I have a lot to say. Good afternoon, my name is Taylor Smith. I am a graduate student at the University of Kentucky and a Lexington native. I currently live around the corner from Stone and Maxwell. And I'm here to express my concern, displeasure, and deep sadness regarding the proposed developments for the block of Stone and Maxwell. Also, I would like to note, I was not reached out to, nor were any of my roommates, nor neighbors about the developments for the neighborhood meetings. I would like to begin by discussing the housing and affordability crisis that students like myself and my friends are facing. By pointing out that developments would only situate these issues because the hub targets our demographic. I graduated from undergrad at Transylvania in 2021 and had to move home for two years because I could not afford a place of my own, and to no fault of my own either. I worked two, sometimes three jobs. When I finally got into graduate school, I got an apartment off of Maxwell. It was the only option for me due to affordability and its close proximity to campus. The hub was not. The redevelopment of this block would raise surrounding prices and make the area inaccessible for students and young adults. Chipping away our opportunities, once I moved in, I soon discovered that not only was the area affordable and riddled with historic charm, but it was also an area that is lived in, where community is created and sustained. In an era of technology and working from home, a communal neighborhood is essential, especially for young adults like myself. My roommates and I know our neighbors. We chat with them on the sidewalks. We attend their parties, their birthdays. We know their ins and outs of their lives and their struggles. The proposed development would take so much of these community building processes away. It would shut people, quite literally, into boxes behind closed doors and isolate their potential outside community. All while overcharging them for parking and everything. One of my favorite things about Fayette County is its strong sense of community, which is built on mutual support and understanding that it is one of the best places to live. That is priceless, and these blocks of apartments would remove that, up prices, create a bigger traffic issue, and force people to move out of town eventually. I speak for many of my neighbors and local residents who could not be here today because this meeting has been scheduled during their work and school days, which is understandable. But before I leave you, I also have one more plea, not for myself, but for my friend. Who writes, who used to live there, and still would be if she hadn't had to move from work. Who also would like to express that the community she developed while living on Comia was untouchable from her experience going to UK. And I would also, before I conclude, like to say that I'm very glad, as previously mentioned, Lexington is celebrating our 250th year. I would hate to see that go to waste by destroying parts of our historic community. Thank you. Thank you. Hello, my name is Matthew Meyer. I live on 265 Lindhurst Place, so I am one street away from this construction. I am a PhD student who works and lives with University of Kentucky. I am a perfect person who could get an apartment in a core building. I would like to say no to this project. I have colleagues who have lived in core properties who have been utterly miserable. I have a colleague who actually came to me the other day absolutely sobbing because they live in this block. And they're facing homelessness. So we are now facing a point of, it does not matter if you only unhouse, say, 80 people for this property. It will be another year or two years before this building gets completed to where people can actually live in it. And we run into this problem time and time again with developments like this. If construction has to happen, why does it, one, have to happen to a property that is currently already occupied? Two, in a historic neighborhood. And three, in a neighborhood that houses the very students that they are trying to house. That is all I have. Thank you very much. Thank you. Hi, my name is Kathy Reynolds, and I'm a member of the Ailsford Neighborhood Association. And also a member of the Houseward Corporation for the sorority that is across the street from where this is going to happen if it's approved. Try not to repeat what other people have said, but about five years ago, we spent a lot of money redoing our house. We retained the historic building itself. We took off the 1960 additions, put a new addition on the back. We did everything we could to keep it in keeping with the neighborhood. The development that you all approved and the city council approved with no public input when they knew full well that the neighborhood association was 100% behind, not behind it. They did not, they were very upset about it. Same thing got disapproved in 2020. Now, this is the third one to come along. We don't think it fits. And the other thing is the traffic study, which you all talked about. At the planning committee that you guys had, where you were telling the neighborhood about what was happening. I think it was somebody on the planning council admitted that this most recent traffic study was done in the summertime, when the students aren't even here. So of course there was a lot less traffic. But anyway, we just do not feel that another downtown business zoning in the middle of a neighborhood is appropriate. The one you approved last year was bad enough. And the no setback, they're going to have a setback on Maxwell, but the other three streets are not, and it's not a neighborhood. It ruins the neighborhood. Thank you. Thank you. Hi, I'm David Burton. Thank you for your time. I'll be brief. I'm a business owner and some property owner in the Lexington, UK area, particularly Southville. And campus area, have been for 35 years. I'm speaking on support of this project. I think it merits, it's the right project for the right spot here, basically. Just mentioned about traffic. The benefit of a project like this is to eliminate traffic. It's to put people where they live and where they work. Students work across the street at the university. And this will eliminate a lot of the traffic. It's going to be here anyway, unless the university decides to close their doors. Only makes sense that it should be as close as possible. This development, as you know, is literally across the street from the university. It holds the density, I guess, values that the city has been proposing. And I believe it's very consistent with that. This area was, or is currently, and was developed primarily as multi-family. There was some single family, but many, many years ago, it's converted over to multi-family. So before that, it wasn't carved out of the wilderness, you understand. I think that was mentioned. This wasn't. This was single family, largest states in that area, and it evolved to multi-family housing. The university's grown a little bit over the last years, maybe, and it's time for it to evolve again. And the housing need is there. I don't believe this company would be investing this type of money if they didn't think it was there. It is a chance for us to see it located at the right place. I believe being across the university, and in between that and the downtown, not in historic district, is all the right mix to put this type of development. This is the right place to put it. It may cause some problems, but it's going to eliminate a lot of problems. Particularly, if you live in a neighborhood near surrounding the university, the pressure is starting to ratchet up. I know, because I'm property. The pressure for housing is starting to ratchet up again. And it's going to spill over into all the neighborhoods. Because students are coming, it's whether they're going to live on campus, essentially, or they're going to live off and commute in. That's essentially what it comes down to. I think this is a solution for a problem that we've had in the past, and we'll probably be facing again here shortly in the future. I do believe that the functional bridge between campus and downtown is what we need to bring more people into our downtown area. On a personal note, I had a property built behind me, behind my house, two years ago, six story building. I was against it, but you know what? I've learned to live with it. It works out fine. It's really not impacted my property or my neighborhood. And I think, like all of us, we have to adapt. Thank you. All righty, thank you very much. The Planning Commission wishes to hear from everybody that would like to speak. Without objection, we will take just a ten minute recess and continue public comment. Thank you. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ We'll resume our public comment. Again, if you wish to speak on this application, please approach the podium, state your name. Everyone gets three minutes, and if we could just have a queue of maybe three or four people at a time. Thank you. My name is Max Stocker. I'm a recent graduate, 2025, of the University of Kentucky. I currently live at 265 Calmia, so that would be right across the street from the proposed development. And however much I would not like for there to be construction across the street, I'd be willing to make the sacrifice, because the city of Lexington is in extreme demand and need for housing. There's currently not enough housing for students and young professionals like myself. This development would bring student housing as well as one bedroom apartments, like things that I would need. I do now currently know that a lot of my friends' students look for housing. They start to move into single family neighborhoods, where it's five kids in college and then a family with kids right next to them, and I don't think anybody would like that. So I think a development like this would put all the students in one place collectively. Therefore, leave more housing for single families with kids and children on streets like Transylvania and such. Also, I know that these houses are known to be historic, but historic is just another word for old. A lot of them are dilapidated and falling down. Two nights ago, one of my neighbors called me to tell me, during the storm, there was water coming through her roof and it was leaking. So these buildings are quite old, they're getting run down, and eventually they are going to have to come down. And I think new housing does have to be built for the city of Lexington. Thank you. Thank you. Hi, I'm April Bicey. I live at 282 Rose Street, and I would like to repeat at least one thing. That I've been here for six years, right in that same spot, and nobody has ever come out and asked me for my opinion or feedback, or yes or no, about this development. So community feedback, I don't know what community they were reaching to, but it certainly was not in the immediate area. And I also would like to remind everybody that we, residents and students, are not an enigma. We are not beds, we are people. We're not profit, we're people. And we have lives that live downtown Lexington on Maxwell, Rose, all these Lindhurst, all these places, we're people, not just profit turnovers. We don't leave in the summer and come back. We stay there all year round. And I would also like to note that the traffic data in 2022 that was obtained has certainly changed over the last three years. I know myself on 282 Rose Street, I have recently gotten a car to add to that traffic. And three of my neighbors have also gotten cars. It takes me at least five minutes to back out of my driveway some days. And, sorry, I didn't really prepare for this. But I do feel called to say that my beautiful balcony does not want to overlook these Soviet reminiscent buildings. I quite like the skyline, and so does everybody else that's ever visited my apartment over the last six years. Lexington is a charming, quaint, historic downtown area with lots of charm. You know, it's not the hub. And in all my six years and all my friends, nobody has ever recommended we go to the hub. It's never been a place that any of us have ever wanted to go hang out or be around, frankly. And this feels like it's causing way more problems. I know that there's solutions that can be done long term. Perhaps fixing what we already have might be a good option, I don't know. But it took me an extra 20 minutes to simply meet my friend that I brought here to, they live two streets away from me, and I had to walk. I didn't even know where to walk because this sinkhole that y'all have already made has completely obstructed so many walking paths, making downtown feel unmovable sometimes. I think that this development is vicious and severely overzealous. I would please ask that you maybe do it one at a time, instead of just bulldozing the entire downtown for your profit margins. Thank you. Thank you. Do I get these six seconds? Hi, I'm Steven Trask, I live at 360 Transylvania Park. I'll just reset it. There you go. I like living near students. I'm not anti-student. Nobody here is anti-student. It's not a civil rights case. But this building is a student-specific building. This housing is made just for students, and it's over-correcting a problem. We've got a demographic cliff, there are 644 beds going up on campus in the Kerwin Blanding building. There are about 1,000 beds already being put on Maxwell Street. We do not need to be tearing this down and displacing the families, and the young professionals, and the graduate students, and the teachers who walk to work, who live in those buildings that are very affordable, who would never live in the hub. I have had friends who live in these buildings, a musician who is also training to be a master electrician, a young social worker. Both these people have started families. I have a friend right now who works in the IT department at the University of Kentucky, and he walks to work amidst an army of people walking to work. They're not students, they're young professionals who walk to work. You are creating a problem of density. You're not solving density. Putting student housing next to a university does not solve a density issue. Putting housing that families want to live in, that young professionals want to live in, that recent graduates want to live in, that solves a density problem. If my friends are displaced, the lawyer who started a family in one of these buildings, the young electrician who started a family in one of these buildings, the social worker, the IT worker. If you displace them, they'll all have to get cars, and they'll all have to drive in, and they won't have that affordable housing where they can walk downtown to the clubs, and they can walk to restaurants, and they can walk to work. So that students can pay way too much money and pile on way too much debt. The University of Kentucky caters to a lot of first generation students. When my husband started teaching here, he was told, a lot of your students are going to be first generation to go to college. He said, I'm the first person in my family to go to college, okay? A lot of the people are already cash strapped, and they can't be affording these rents, and to tear down all of these blocks to put in beds as opposed to bedrooms, which is what normal people call it. It's only prisons, dorms, and hospitals where we refer to them as beds, okay? So this would be a slum if not students were living there. I'm sorry, it just would be. It's the wrong project in the wrong place at the wrong time. There are plenty of places closer to my house that I would be happy to see a hub. This is not the spot for it. Thank you. Thank you. I have a handout I'm going to pass up. I think they're going to put it on the screen. Sorry, I didn't print out enough for everyone. Are you able to put it on the screen? Okay. Hi, everyone. My name is Maynard Leon. I'm a resident of the Alesford neighborhood. I live at 7 Preston Quarter on the corner. I'm going to limit the scope of my comments today to the massing of the proposed building, which I believe is out of scale with the adjacent H1 overlay zone for the Alesford Historic District. And push back on planning's points of approval for this massing. So in the earlier report, staff noted two points regarding the massing that stuck out to me. AD.2, relate the overall height, size, and character of the development to that of the adjacent structures and those of the immediate neighborhood. The second one was Theme A, Design Policy 4.2. New construction should be at an appropriate scale to respect the context of neighboring structures. However, along major corridors, it should set the future context in accordance with other imagined Lexington corridor policies and placeholder initiatives. Now, I think the term future context is important here because the built form of the H1 zone will never change. So this project will have to negotiate between the fabric that's existing and the new multifamily developments down Maxwell. The neighborhood has asked the applicant multiple times to provide documentation including renderings and drawings that illustrate the proposed building in the context of the adjacent protected buildings as well as the new buildings. And to my knowledge, we have not received this. None of the drawings or renderings have showed any of the actual adjacent buildings. In their updated report from this morning, staff states that the revised design incorporates changes in the massing and weight of the building in order to transition the scale of the development currently in the proposed area. And that's kind of cool, right? There we go. Now, I would suggest that a jump from 25 to 30 feet straight to 80 feet on Kelmia. And then if you go to the Rose cross section. So we can see. Yes. This setback in relation to the adjacent building, I'd posit that this actually does not negotiate this difference. Can you go to the other 11 by 17, please? The applicant followed staff's recommendation to add light wells along stone. But they significantly reduced the size of the light wells along Maxwell, resulting in a much bulkier massing along the primary facade. And the applicant has increased their overall unit count with this revision. So it stands to reason that the pro forma can accommodate any reduction of units needed to achieve a more significant and appropriate setback that truly relates to the surrounding context as you see here on the screen. I appreciate the applicant's willingness to talk to the neighborhood. And I hope you will take this feedback because this is the one thing that the neighborhood never received from the applicant. Thank you. Thank you. I'm John Mickler. I live on 415 East Maxwell Street, a couple blocks from this proposed project. I would like to begin to acknowledge my son Robin is a member of this committee. And I want to go on record saying my son and I have not had a moment's conversation about this matter. I'm not sure if he's glad I'm here, but I need to speak. I would like to point out that the proponents for this zone change are but one individual and their purpose is economic. They want to say they are concerned with our community interests. But we as individuals and community groups are coming before you to tell you that they are not. Their arguments are based on their economics, which is limited and should not be given more weight than the values of this community. We are not a market, we are a diverse community. The proponents would have you think that they are making concessions based on neighbor's comments. Look at what they have done. They've heard repeated comments about size and come back with a proposal for more beds. They will do whatever window dressing is needed, otherwise to get what they want. The fact is, meeting a need for housing is neither the only issue nor the most important issue. We acknowledge this proposal conforms to the comprehensive plans, theme A, goal two of supporting infill. But that goal must be balanced against the goal two objective of respecting the context and design features of areas of surrounding development projects. We have to look at what the community can absorb. The question is, what is the size of the development which addresses all the needs of the community? The needs of the community are not addressed by putting the maximum number of beds or building the maximum footprint. We have a vibrant neighborhood with a school, a park, businesses, and residences housing people with a broad diversity of incomes. We would be trading some of this diversity for this very uniform demographic. Sometimes you don't realize how damaging something is until the damage is done. Sometimes we have to think of the future. Look how different this neighborhood will be of the ongoing overwhelming impact. This uniformity and congestion will bring on this neighborhood and community. This eight stories will loom forever over the two stories across Rose Street in the Ellsford District. They should not be able to build ignoring this community. You should find the proposal and zone change request out of proportion to the context and design features of the surrounding neighborhood. It is not what this community needs. What is important is what this community deserves. Thank you. Thank you. May I hand out my letter? Sure. Yeah. Good afternoon. My name is Amy Clark. I reside at 628 Castle Road, so I am within this area of neighbors of the university, and these are both tenants and householders, and has been said. Many sorts of families, sorts and conditions, single persons, and also couples who share responsibilities, children, elderly. I urge that the commission vote to deny the upzoning to downtown frame B2A. I don't see anything frame about it, of a full block of East Maxwell Street at Rosenstone, fully occupied at significant density, protect the established land use, its historic development, and the welfare of the surrounding residential neighborhoods and neighbors and properties. Turn to the university and to Frankfurt to keep and establish affordable housing in this critical area. The responsibility for meeting the steep increase in campus enrollment, which is recently bumped up again, with housing accommodation does not lie with the urban county on private land off campus. Now I'm going to jump down to the bottom paragraph of the first set. It's plain that the city has no authority to determine the university's policy on use of land that belongs ultimately to the commonwealth for educational purposes for the university. Our only recourse is to take clear command of the use and development to be permitted on the private land that does fall within Lexington's authority, protecting and improving it for the welfare of our broader community, and especially for the needs of homes and families of every circumstance. Families quite like my own. And I want to turn back to Lexington's greatest infill and redevelopment project. That's the paragraph prior, that is Lexington's greatest infill and redevelopment project, that is to say the University of Kentucky has gone hog wild, redeveloping land on campus and off for among the larger projects recently, a health education building along University Drive at some half billion dollars, another hospital complex for cancer and ambulatory care, and its garage at 1.2 billion, sited on blocks between Nicholasville and Elizabeth Street, acquired from private residential use and ownership. Lately, the trustees have given approval to seek legislative authority to construct as a public private venture, a fan experience district near Kroger Field, conceived as an income bearing mixed use entertainment district to embrace hotel, restaurant, retail, and other facilities. All this and more, while the largest total student body ever enrolled and largest undergraduate class go begging for affordable campus housing. And I will simply add that I have put documentation in the record, the electronic record of the figures and assertions. Thank you. Thank you. Hello. Thank you for your time. My name is Matt Burton. I'm a business owner. I own the local taco on Limestone on UK's campus, as well as Dudley Square in the South Hill neighborhood. I'm in support of this project mainly because this block was originally allocated to high density to fulfill the demand at the time. Due to its unique location of being literally across the street from a UK classroom and two blocks to the downtown trade area. In order for a high density project like this to succeed long term, it has to be pedestrian oriented where residents can walk across the street to a classroom or walk two blocks to the trade area. And for that reason, I think this will be a functional bridge from campus to downtown. And by concentrating this housing, it'll serve as a pressure release valve on the demand of campus property in sprawling and surrounding neighborhoods. So, thank you for your time. Thank you. All right, is there anyone else from the public who would like to speak on this application? Seeing none, thank you very much. Mr. Gross, would you like to have a word? Just a few items, and I'll keep this brief, and I'll keep to no new evidence, more or less. We can keep people from coming back up and trying to rebut my rebuttal. First, on the neighborhood engagement, to the extent that people did not receive notice, I apologize. We tried our best. We let Beth Musgrave know, so she put it in the paper. We let the council member know. We let planning staff was there. I sent notice letters to each neighborhood association from South Hill, Aylesford, everyone. So, to the extent that people are not a part of that neighborhood association, they may not have received notice, but we tried to inform as many people as we could. On the traffic study, just so everyone's aware, we did a supplement after school started. So, while the original one was done prior to our filing, that's a requirement. We went back and did an additional study after school was back in, so we'd catch those counts. And we did actually do a new count, so during the peak hours, AM, PM, we had counters at the four intersections. So those are accurate numbers, and we also based our needs on a suburban apartment type complex in which everyone will be driving, and we expect on this particular project, most people will be walking to and from school and downtown, and they will hopefully not use their cars as often. And then, the last thing I would mention is that we're currently R3. The R3 permits a 60 foot building. We're going up another 25 feet to 85 feet. So, we could, by right, build 60 feet here. The setbacks are very similar, ten and five-fifteens. So essentially, this building could more or less be built without a zone change. The only reason we're asking for the zone change is to house two more levels of housing on this project. So, realistically, we're talking about 25 feet in the grand scheme of what's permitted. And then lastly, as been noted in the staff report, as Ms. Burr has noted, these buildings are not in an H1 overlay. The property owners could have them removed tomorrow if they so chose. And so, we just need to keep that in when we're deliberating, just think about the fact that something will likely go here. And it could be this project, or it could be a different project, but the property owners are not Regulatory restricted from bringing these buildings down and building a 60 foot story building in this location. So, that's all. Have you any questions? And if not, I'll sit my butt down. Sure. Commissioner Molly Davis. Thank you. Mr. Gross, you just said that this area is zoned R3, I thought it was R4. Sorry. I meant R4. Okay. Sorry, I misspoke. No worries. R3 is on the other side of Rose. It's R4. Thank you. Sorry. I'm going to make sure I wrote my notes correct. Thank you very much. Clarification. Two points. One is to that point, it's my understanding that if you were to develop an R4, it would not be just the height that was an issue, but the fact that there's not green space provided for at the levels that R4 would require. That is correct. We would have to seek a variance to have less green space with the R4. Or provide more. Or provide more. That is correct. The other aspect in the public comment we received, we got a previous and current comparison of the light wells. And there was a lot of conversation about this. And it's got some measurements showing a significant reduction in those light wells along Maxwell Street. And could you speak briefly to that? Yeah, and so when we met with staff, and less with the neighbors, more staff, the idea was how we were breaking up the scale and the massing of the building in light wells was one way that we were accomplishing that. And so when we were discussing with staff, staff recommended that we should have light wells along stone. So that all four sides hide light wells. And so to do that, we reduced the light wells on Maxwell and shifted that space on to stone. Which would let us continue to have apartments that are appropriately sized on stone. If we made larger light wells on stone, we would essentially reduce the number of units that could be built along stone. So it was a trade off in our discussions with staff. Yeah, come up. I just wanted to add one point. The light wells, we added them on stone. Those units he was describing are price sensitive units, so they're square blocks. So before, stone was like a straight wall, which was all of our price sensitive units because of the way they lay out. So when we moved the light wells from Maxwell to stone, we were able to keep those price sensitive units by kind of shifting them around. So the light wells on Maxwell got a little bit smaller. We kept our price sensitive units and then added light wells on stone to make sure we kept those units. Okay, thank you. If you'll stay there for just a second, go back to your, I think your presentation you talked about 200 to 300 beds at $900 price sensitive units. In listening to the audience and thinking about not beds but units. Can you give us some idea of how many price sensitive units you'll be constructing there and what those price ranges will be? Yep, so if we do the quick math, sorry. It's going to be, so it's around 300 total units. On a unit basis, it should be roughly 15% of units. So 45, 50 units will be in that price range. And then the price range, whatever. Sorry, well they're leased to individual students, so that price range would still stay the same. So $900 for that space. You're welcome. And again, those are at Hub Upper and Hub Limestone and fully leased for next year as well. So there is a lot of demand in people for those units. Okay, do we have any more questions for the applicant or Mr. Gross? Seeing none. Thank you very much. At this point, does staff have anything to add, or if you're good, all right. Then we will close this portion of the hearing and take it to commissioner, discussion, comment. And as always, the floor is open for a motion. Mr. Mickler. Well, I'm going to comment, and I can't help but put this in a little bit of the context of my deliberation over two other Maxwell Street hearings that we've had. Because there's some parallels, and I think there's some differences for me. I think one of the parallels that we're seeing in all of these, that I'm struggling with every one of these applications, is that as we're using the downtown zone in our second tier urban neighborhoods, which is not something the comprehensive plan has called for, we're nearly eliminating all green space and tree canopy on the properties themselves. And we're doing that for the sake of density, and I don't know that we really, and I've said this in our meetings, I don't know that this is really a long-term strategy that we want in terms of extending this sort of level of where green space is limited to the street trees into our neighborhoods outside of the downtown area. I think that the H1 is also not the only means of historic preservation. I think that, and that's where I think this block is different for me. When we talk about highest and best use, certainly if we mean highest and best as literally the highest and the most number of beds, then we clearly have a proposal that is seeking that. I think that these buildings, to an extent that we haven't seen in the two other blocks, were built for multi-family, were built for apartments, and they have details that are incredible, like some of the other houses in the neighborhood. But they are targeting the exact goal that we're calling for with the middle housing in our comprehensive plan. And it's a complete block, it's intact, there's nothing missing. And if we leave the current zoning in place, a lot of these buildings provide a lot of units for the size lot they're on, and the buildings are sturdy and well built. And that in and of itself acts as a historic preservation means without all of the burdens and details of H1. So I sort of agree with the letter from the State Historic Commissioner Potts that this block is different. And I think that this is a healthy, vibrant block, and a beautiful example of a town and gown neighborhood connection with apartment buildings from the 1920s. And I'm a no on this zone change. All righty, Mr. Nickel. Thank you all very much for your presentation. I kind of, I just want to make a comment from the macro level of the problems we're facing here in our community with housing. We're in a housing shortage. With a housing shortage, we see an increase in pricing of market rate housing, affordable housing, attainable housing, whatever euphemism you want to use to describe the problem that we are facing. Last year, there was a Kentucky Housing Corporation report that came out that anticipated that Fayette County, by 2029, needs an additional 30,000 units. 30,000 units, which is roughly, for the remainder of time until 2029, that's looking like about 6,000 units a year. That's single family, that's multi-family, it's duplexes, it's four-plexes, it's all types of housing that is needed. And the numbers that we worked on last week in our affordable housing round table, we're showing our production on an annual basis is 1,500 units. So we're seeing a significant gap between what is needed and what we're producing. So I commend the applicant with their effort to 12x the density of a parcel of property in a time when we need it. Thank you. Mr. Wilson. It seems like we've been displaced before. And it seems it's always the case where the university is growing, and yet they have no means, or at least have not indicated where they're going to put the students. And so one of the first questions I had is, at the last time we were here at this point, there was going to be a master plan produced by the University of Kentucky in terms of student projections, as well as housing needs for those students as it was coming forward. I guess, and a simple question is, and I don't mean to take us too far off line here, have we heard any more about that master plan, or are they going to do anything with it? You might, you did. I believe the answer's no. Maybe Mr. Dunn. Wrong time and wrong place, Jim. Sorry, I'm waiting. For UK? Yes. What I, I don't know when you walked in, but the question was that I was asking is that we were, it's like the deja vu, we've been here before with the different issues around town. And the last time we were here talking about this, it was determined that the University of Kentucky had a master plan, or was putting together a master plan in terms of their student growth potential, as well as how they're going to handle the students who are coming in. And I guess my question is, have we heard anything from them, or is that still on the back? Mr. Wilson, I would say we have not heard an update about that, so I don't have any new information on what their plan is for that. Certainly something we can continue to try to get, but they've not shared anything with us. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Duncan. Do we have any other comments, Mr. Penn? You know, I'm a, I'm a big believer in the comp plan. I think you make the plan, you work the plan, and you try to get, have a better community because of the plan. And I've been here long enough, and I've seen three of them. But I will tell you that I think it's an indisputable fact that the University of Kentucky does not want to house their students on their land. They wouldn't have tore down those big high rises and built back another one, as Ms. Clark said, and picked up eight acres. The University of Kentucky, in my opinion, has way more use for that land than housing students. So what this has done, and Bruce is right, what this has done is created a situation where the city of Lexington is going to ultimately have to house both of the students at the University of Kentucky. Yeah, they built another dorm, nothing to compare those two high rises. So how do we, how do we meet the university's needs and meet our needs? And that's, you know, when I vote against Prowltown, it was because it was an established neighborhood. They had people living there that lived there for generations, and I didn't want to tear that up. This situation here, I'm really at a crossroad. I don't believe that this current proposal will have anything left after 30 years. I think it's a 30-year project, and you'll be back doing something else in 25 to 30 years. Where these houses have stood the test of time, but they don't have the density. So our comp plan calls for density, and as much as I don't like what the University of Kentucky is doing, I have no control over that. Their trustees and their business model is not going to be housing and feeding students. It's going to be creating higher and best use, whether it be dorm, whether it be classroom buildings, athletic facilities, whatever. So I'm going to vote for this because the comp plan says we need the density. And I'm doing it with a heavy heart because I really, I'm like Robin, I don't like to see these big buildings torn down. But if we can put this many units in this size of space, and if we have to do it again in 30 years, you'll have to do it again in 30 years. They won't last what those houses did. We might as well accept that as we go. Thank you. All right, Commissioner Molly Davis. I want to thank everyone who's gotten up and spoken, and Brandon for your presentation and for the presentation from Core Spaces. This is certainly a challenging project to consider. I grew up on Transylvania Park, so I'm pretty familiar with the area. And Mr. Grosch, you make really good financial arguments. The increase in real estate taxes, several folks from the business community. I'm not saying anything new, but I do want to mention just a couple of things. As Mr. Penn says, we know this is going to be for primarily UK students because of its location and because of how it is. And it's certainly a shame to have the existing multi-family structures kind of done away with, because I understand it is a really great place to rent, probably not to own. I guess I just have some trouble with a couple of things. One is that Robin and I both sit on the downtown master plan advisory committee. And the thing they have asked at every public meeting is where is downtown? And no one seems to have a definite view of where it is. And it wasn't defined in the RFP for the consultant to deal with. So I kind of feel like we're kind of not really sure exactly if this is downtown or not. So for that reason, I'm not sure if the downtown frame B to A zone makes sense for this area. I feel like there are also cascading effects from this being the third block to be considered for a very large development. And I don't think we know the full impacts in terms of traffic, in terms of tree loss, in terms of the multimodal nature of Maxwell and Rose and others. And I think the thing that probably bothers me most is the lack of a transition between this development and the historic, the H1 neighborhood designation. The renderings that Mr. Leon provided with us show a way that that could happen, but our job isn't to design projects. It's to talk about them in general and whether or not they follow the rules and the laws that we have to adhere to. And it was with great regret that I'm not sure how I'm going to vote, because I know how important this is to increase the number of housing units in the city. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Davis. And Mr. Forster's prepared to make a motion before he does that. Can I ask? Yes, sir. Are all comments made or done? Yeah, go ahead. I have been very conflicted about this application. However, I believe we have an applicant who has worked in extraordinarily good faith. And I certainly agree with Mr. Penn's sentiments. I drive by these buildings every day, and I admire them very much. But again, for me, I know that the positives outweigh some of the negatives. So I will support the application. Mr. Forster. Just a build on to a couple of the comments. I mean, I've changed my vote three times sitting here today. Back and forth and back and forth. And I do know this neighborhood. I don't live it anymore. When I came to UK at one point, I lived in the only remaining house on Linden Walk right across the street from the Newman Center. The rest of that is UK parking lots, and it's absolutely devastated that street. That's the worst example of what we can do to that area. What I would hope, and I say this as someone who's been president of a neighborhood association, is that approving this development will create enough housing for UK students to relieve some of the pressure on our other neighborhoods, because they're under pressure. And if we can do that, I think the whole community will benefit. But looking at not a projected and not just a UK shortage, we're looking at 22,000 people who need additional units right now. And we have to address that need. And I don't like a lot of what we're being asked to do. I sit on the committee that watched this plan develop over time. And I will say to you, I think it's a much more appealing plan than the one we first got. Does it address all the problems that you all raised today? No, but it's where we are. So I'm going to support it, but I do that with reservations. And Mr. Forrester, before you begin, I want to express the Planning Commission's gratitude for everyone who came down to speak today. It's very important. We do listen. We do take it into consideration. Mr. Forrester's going to make a motion that may or may not be seconded. But when we do get to a vote, please let the commission take a vote. If you do not wish to stay for the remainder of the meeting, please exit quietly, because we do have another agenda item. Discussions can continue, but if they could, please, in the lobby or in the hall. Mr. Forrester. It's a question for staff. For the zone change, does staff recommend disapproval or postponement? There's a- Approval for zone change, I've got to revise for the development plan. There is a revised staff report in Granicus, or a supplemental report related to the zone change. And it includes the three findings that Mr. Young presented, as well as conditional zoning restrictions. Okay, all right. And then all of our zone changes are recommended, if they're recommended for approval, with the development plan. Yeah, yeah, all right, all right. Okay. Okay, so respectfully, I would like to make a motion for approval of PLN MAR 25-14, based on the staff recommendations. Thank you, Mr.- In Granicus. Thank you, Mr. Forrester. And that's a second from Mr. Wilson. Thank you. Is there any discussion on that motion? Seeing none, we will put that. This is for the zone change. Okay, that carries with two and negative. Mr. Forrester. Second, I'd like to make a motion for the approval of PLN MJDP 25-51, based on the staff revised recommendation. This sheet here. Thank you very much. Do we have a second to that motion? Commissioner Barksdale, thank you. Any discussion? This is for the development plan. Mr. McClure. This is a question for staff, sort of in regards to the new development sort of process. The, we saw on the other Maxwell Street a reduction in the number of townhomes proposed from the preliminary plan to the final plan. Is there a number that has been given at this point for those units? Mr. McClure, we proposed 18 townhouses. Would you feel comfortable specifying that number on the notes here that town, the conditions that staff has proposed? Yes, we would, with the caveat that we could come back to you for some reason, something unforeseen comes up, and we've got to go to 17. But yeah, we'll commit to the 18, would you? I can amend that motion to include adding 18 townhome units. Okay. All right, and Ivor, you're, okay. Okay, motion and a second. Any discussion on the development plan other than Mr. McClure's? That's fine. All right, we'll take that to a vote as well. And that carries with one negative. Thank you all very much. Next item on the agenda is on page seven. Letter C, item number one, amendment to manufactured housing regulations. Mr. Crum. Good afternoon, Daniel Crum, planning staff. Yes, my item isn't as appealing. I won't take it personally. I was going to say, Daniel, don't turn around. It's all right, it happens. This is, as you all aware, the ZOTA 2507 is the amendment that was sort of instituted by the state with their House Bill 160. So this is playing catch up in making sure that we're in line with state law that's going to take effect next year. So just bringing everybody back up to speed, in 2025 the House modified the portions of KRS that deal with mobile and manufactured homes. And so a new bill was passed that we are now having to respond to that deals with qualified manufactured homes. And it limits the local government's abilities to require different zones, criteria, other requirements relative to site built housing. So the difference and the nuance between manufactured and mobile homes is based on the year that we're constructed. So 1974, a national law was passed, so 1976 is sort of the dividing line. So these factory built homes prior to 76 are considered mobile homes and were reviewed under a specific type of criteria. Those were expanded and altered in 76, so that cut off, everything past that is considered a manufactured home. Qualified manufactured homes are that new subset that the state has created and says when these homes meet these criteria, you have to treat them like site build housing. Really one of the main kind of conditions of that is it's a year of construction. So it has to be installed within five years of construction, so older homes don't qualify. This talks about permanently affixing it to a foundation, so all the wheels and transport apparatus are removed, affixed to a foundation, and have a minimum size requirement that totals to 900 square feet. State law does give the property owner the ability to use a smaller home on a lot that otherwise meets all of the criteria except it isn't large enough to support such a home. And so the staff, as a result, were responsible for bringing this forward and making sure that our ordinance was aligned. Here are some examples of what those qualified manufactured homes, once again, different than sort of the preconceived notions that even myself had before I became fully knowledgeable on this particular topic. But here's examples of homes that would not meet qualifying standards if they don't have a foundation, if they are older than five years old from the time they were constructed, or they do not meet the size requirements that are established by that threshold. They are not qualified manufacturing homes, and therefore we have the ability to regulate those separately like we have historically. So the updates that are needed, and staff did not have any new updates relative to the language that was sent out with the committees. So it has definition updates as well as updates to the mobile home park, the M1P zone, that talks about creating this definition, qualifying the two out so that these qualified manufactured homes are treated identically. We have updates to the mobile home park zone that kind of specifies and clarifies that. It brings up to date some of the old lagging standards for when the mobile home park was created at least in the 1950s, and then updating those use allowances. So there's no new update to the staff language that you all have taken a look at and has been kind of on your radar. So we recommend the approval of the text that we wrote for the reasons that it's necessary in order to bring us in line with the House Bill 160 requirements and further some of our comprehensive plan goals. So with that, it's the same text you've been looking at before. I'd be happy to answer any questions there are of staff, and we do have the text in front of us if we want to go into really any further specifics. Thank you. Just one question. I heard a program yesterday on the radio which reiterated a lot of the concerns we had about a previous zone change in development that was manufactured housing. And particularly a concern that people who are living in a mobile home, manufactured home park, get their rents jacked up, can't afford to move their properties, all that kind of stuff. I'm not trying to solve that problem here, but just for clarification, if someone chooses to purchase a manufactured home, they can put that home on a single lot as long as it meets all the other requirements. It does not have to go into a mobile home park, is that correct? Yes, this is really to provide a pathway to use that sort of more affordable product as long as it meets the requirements. This could go in a R1 lot, this could go in an R3 lot, really anywhere that you could envision and would be allowed to construct a detached single family home, this would allow for that. Yes, sir. Can this be a part of our affordable housing? So really this is sort of agnostic to the funding mechanism behind it. I mean, this unequivocally, it is cheaper to buy a manufactured home than it is to have a new site build house constructed of that same thing. So there is, in an essence, some cost savings there. There's nothing in this that is mandating or directly linking it to sort of the textbook definition, but this is giving us another housing option within our toolkit to help address the housing need in our community. And really in a more affordable fashion, rather than sort of textbook affordable housing link. Well, I'm not saying I'm this old, but I will tell you that after the Second World War, you could buy a house at Sears and Roebuck. You could buy a house at Montgomery Ward. It would be shipped in and you'd put it on your property. So I didn't experience that, but I know a lot of houses that were built at that time and are still there. Including in our own community. Yeah. Okay, does anybody have any more questions for Daniel at this time? Is there anyone from the public who would like to speak on this today? Seeing none. That happens. Mr. Pan was going to make a motion. You ready for a motion? Yes, sir. If there's no more discussion. We're ready for a motion. Sure. Mr. Chair, I move to approve the alternative text for PLNZLTA 25-7 as amendment to the Manufactured Housing Regulations as compliance with House Bill 160 with a staff alternative. Thank you, Commissioner Penn. We have a second from Commissioner Wirth. Any discussion? Seeing none, we can take that to a vote. All right, and are we, is that unanimous? I can't, I guess it is, yes. Okay, do we have any commissioner items or staff items? Mr. Wilson. Not staff, I have one. Yes, sir. Okay, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Duncan, one of the things, and I think I appreciate your comment related to the master report from the University of Kentucky. I don't know what kind of timeline they're on as it relates to that. But here's the thought. If in fact they are saying to you or to say to us as a commission, we don't know when we'll get around to doing that master plan. I would suggest we write a letter to Dr. Capilouto and ask him point blank that we're in the planning processes, getting ready for our next five year plan, and it would be helpful if you could give us expeditiously some information about what your plans are for that particular thing. And I'm going to add this, but I'm not going to say a name on the mic. We actually had a presentation by one of the attorneys representing a developer who showed us a map of UK's plan heading toward downtown. So, I kind of think there's one in existence, but I'm not going to say more than that. Mr. Chairman, I guess one other quick thing. The reason why I'm sort of encouraging that to take place is, I think for future planning purposes, we ought to know and have in writing what their thinking is. And if their writing is, if they want to structure their writing in a loose-like fashion, that's one thing. But I'd like to get them on record. Mr. Penn. Yeah, Mr. Duncan, you all might decide who needs to sign that letter. And I'm going to volunteer, Zach, as a alternative. Mr. Chair, in response to that, I will say, and a couple of our planning commissioners know this as well, UK is a member of the advisory committee for the downtown master plan. And so, I'd certainly think we have an avenue to ask some questions about the status of what their proposals are for the area as we're doing our own downtown master plan. All right, does anybody have anything else to Mr. Wilson's point? Okay, Mr. Duncan, do we have anything? Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you all for today. I echo what you all said. You were to hear and listen to the comments of the citizens. I believe that means a lot to them, and it means a lot to staff as well. We will see you all next week at committees 830 and 130 in the Phoenix building. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Mr. Duncan. Without objection, we are adjourned. Thank you. Thank you.