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HomeMy WebLinkAbout20140822 Ver 1_Emails_20140410 (5)Burdette, Jennifer a From: Neal Tucker [NTucker @stimmelpa.com] Sent: Thursday, April 10, 2014 4:57 PM To: Burdette, Jennifer a; Ana Jaramillo Cc: Homewood, Sue; Jeff Hunter Qhunter @popecompanies.com); 'Hank Perkins' (hank @eastcoastcapital.net); Tom Davis (tdavis @leainc.com) Subject: RE: Blue Diamond Variance Attachments: Blue Diamond Variance Request - Appended - WQC -EMC 4- 10- 14.doc Jennifer, Attached you will find a draft of the additional information you and I discussed yesterday for the Blue Diamond Variance. I have used a letter that I wrote to Russell Radford, former Kernersville Town Engineer, last September requesting the variance. I don't know if you've seen this letter, although much of the argument in the letter was included in the variance request application. I have appended the letter (shown in blue) to more specifically address some of the items you and I discussed. If this letter provides sufficient information, I can reformat as needed for the final version. If additional information is needed, please let me know. I've also talked to Jeff Hunter with Pope Companies (member of Blue Diamond) regarding the 'ownership history' question, and he will write a letter stating that Blue Diamond has no ownership interest in the VA project. Thank you and let me know if I can provide any further information. Neal i -% t i WNO-" -, 1 LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE I CIVIL ENGINEERING I LAND PLANNING J. Neal Tucker, P.E. Partner/ Director of Civil Engineerin 336.723.1067 x104 I cell: 336.817.2524 601 N. Trade St, Suite 200 1 Winston - Salem, NC 27101 www.stiminelpa.com 5IiIIL"O e! , i Al. Ic -moil 1X V, laimer From: Burdette, Jennifer a [ mailto :Jennifer.Burdette @ncdenr.gov] Sent: Thursday, April 10, 2014 2:23 PM To: Ana Jaramillo Cc: Homewood, Sue; Neal Tucker Subject: Blue Diamond Variance Hi Ana, If you make changes to your findings of fact would it have to be approved by the Town Board? Here's a link to the March EMC -WQC meeting agenda http : / /Portal.ncdenr.org /web /emc /march- 12 -wqc- agenda that we discussed. See Item #2 for a link to the PowerPoint presentation that I used. I spoke with Neal Tucker yesterday morning, and we had a good discussion of the issues that the Committee members had with the project and the additional practical difficulties and unnecessary hardships that I perceive associated with strict compliance of the rule on this project. The basis for separate stormwater treatment and the difficulties and hardships associated with the subject site include the following: 1. Stormwater BMP inspection, maintenance and compliance would be more difficult for the Town to enforce and therefore less effective with a BMP that is owned and utilized by more than one entity or owner 2. Decentralized stormwater treatment is more effective than centralized SW treatment C 3. A large SW BMP is required to treat stormwater runoff from the amount of impervious surface proposed on the VA site. Treating upslope stormwater in addition to the VA site stormwater runoff in one centralized BMP would create an even larger BMP that would be a potential safety hazard. a L� 4. The presence of a relatively large upslope drainage area ff S. Sequence of development i.e. development occurring at the bottom of the drainage area prior to the I upslope development 6. The predevelopment topography of the Blue Diamond site consists of two drainage areas, which would C��. require two BMPs in order to treat stormwater prior to discharging through the buffer. Due to the large contiguous flat area and site grading required for commercial development that is planned for the site, these predevelopment BMPs would more than likely need to be removed and new BMP(s) be designed and constructed for the developed site. C I 7. The inability to construct a bypass channel for the Blue Diamond property after the VA site is constructed. In addition to these items, I believe Neal is prepared to explain why some of the stormwater design information requested by the Committee is not available and discuss the ownership of the two properties. Below is a great explanation of items 1 and 2 that Annette Lucas, a DENR stormwater engineer, provided me for your use. Managing stormwater close to the sources where it is generated helps to reduce the impacts of built -upon areas on the environment, which include increased flows, volumes and pollutant loadings. Dispersing SMPs throughout a large drainage area reduces the size of the conveyances needed to carry stormwater, which reduces the risk of erosion and can also reduce costs. Smaller BMPs can be easier and less costly to maintain and therefore are more likely to be maintained. it is usually impractical for multiple owners to manage a single BMP, even if a satisfactory agreement can be achieved initially, this can be negated if ownership of a property changes. Also, using more BMPs reduces the risk of failure of a single, large BMP. if one component of a BMP network fails, the remainder of the BMPs would still provide stormwater treatment. Thanks, Jennifer Jennifer A. Burdette 401 /Buffer Coordinator 401 & Buffer Permitting Unit Wetlands Branch NCDENR - Division of Water Resources - Water Quality Programs 1650 Mail Service Center Raleigh, NC 27699 -1650 (919) 807 -6364 phone (919) 807 -6494 fax *Email correspondence to and from this address may be subject to the North Carolina Public Records Low and may be disclosed to third parties unless the content is exempt by statute or other regulation.* Stimmel 10. Stimmel Associates, PA Landscape Architecture Civil Engineering Land Planning September 27, 2013 April 10, 2014 (Appended) Town of Kernersville P.O. Drawer 728 Kernersville, NC 27285 Attn: Russell Radford, PE, Town Engineer Subject: Request for Variance for Stormwater Management Requirement in the Pre Blue Diamond Property adjacent to the Proposed Dear Russell, condition Administration Hospital I am writing this letter on behalf of Blue Diamond,11bgstments to reque lance in the timing of installation of stormwater management BMP's for the subject The Veterans stration (VA) Hospital site lies downslope of the Blue Diamond Investments property. The VA its own stor management system, sized to treat runoff from its site only, therfore a stormwater byp s e constru convey stormwater runoff from the Blue Diamond property around or through the VA sit keep Blue D d property separate from that of the VA site. The bypass system discharge point falls with a West iver r which is a tributary within the Randleman Lake Water Supply W A rip rap I ch ill d through the buffer from the discharge point to the river. The Randle re that co runoff fro made conveyances be converted to diffuse flow before the runoff Zone a buffer, stormwater management is provided for the runoff. The State's Stormwater BMP requires 50 ar feet of I preader per cfs of flow to provide diffuse flow from a concentrated discharge For the 1.0 in rainfall, 1,7 ear feet of level spreader is required for the flow from the bypass line. A second re ent for lev aders per the a Manual is that the maximum flow that can be directed to a single level spreader is With flow he bypass line would have to be split into 18 discrete evel spreaders. Additionally, e f the level spreaders are required to be diverted away from the leve These to flows wou71MW1be channelized through the buffer to the stream as currently p at the per is requesting approval of. Given these constraints, it is impractical to convert trated flow e by e to diffuse flow. Since sufficient space to convert discharge from the bypass 3yste use flow is not le out a buffer, a stormwater BMP is required by the Rules. Given the topog characteristics of t e Dia roperty and other upslope properties, Blue Diamond Investments is requesti riance to delay ins ..on of th P until such time as development of the Blue Diamond property begins. A development s no/plases red for the Blue Diamond property. Designing and building a stormwater BMP without a develop an the development to be designed around the BMP, which may not yield the best and highest use e topography of the Blue Diamond property upslope of the VA site forms two drainage basins. Provi management for the property prior to development would require two BMP's to be constructed, or the majorit rty to be graded to drain to a central location. If BMP's are constructed at the current drainage collection p o development, these locations may not work with the final development plan and would have to be moved. This would certainly be the case for the drainage feature adjacent to Kernersville Medical Parkway, as the road frontage will be the most valuable property from a development perspective. Either of these scenarios, mass grading or building BMP's represents a significant financial burden to the developer prior to development activity commencing. 601 N. Trade Street Suite 200 Winston Salem, NC 27101 -2916 Pj336.723.1067 F: 336.723.1069 I A development s no/plases red for the Blue Diamond property. Designing and building a stormwater BMP without a develop an the development to be designed around the BMP, which may not yield the best and highest use e topography of the Blue Diamond property upslope of the VA site forms two drainage basins. Provi management for the property prior to development would require two BMP's to be constructed, or the majorit rty to be graded to drain to a central location. If BMP's are constructed at the current drainage collection p o development, these locations may not work with the final development plan and would have to be moved. This would certainly be the case for the drainage feature adjacent to Kernersville Medical Parkway, as the road frontage will be the most valuable property from a development perspective. Either of these scenarios, mass grading or building BMP's represents a significant financial burden to the developer prior to development activity commencing. 601 N. Trade Street Suite 200 Winston Salem, NC 27101 -2916 Pj336.723.1067 F: 336.723.1069 Blue Diamond Property Stormwater Management Variance Request September 27, 2013 Page 2 What are the impacts to the VA site if their BMP is upsized to treat post - developed runoff from the Blue Diamond property?: As the attached VA storm drainage plan reflects, there is little to no room to expand the mwater pond. We have consulted with the VA's Civil Engineering consultant regarding upsizing their pond to re odate runoff from the Blue Diamond and upslope residential properties in a developed condition. The VA's co oked at this during the design phase of the project and a pond of that size would not fit within the available spa perty. What are the impacts to the VA site if their BMP is upsized to treat property, then bypass Blue Diamond runoff in the post - develope Although not specifically studied, it is possible that the VA pond as bypass system in the pre - developed condition, however when th would have to be disconnected from the VA pond and extend e [ damage to the VA site. Given this, it is unlikely that the VA site What are the impacts to water quality in the Deep River if not treated ?: The total basin area draining to the bypass syst tial. undeveloped, with 0% built upon area (BUA). Th property is very sparsely developed as large lot res aggregate BUA of all properties upslope of the VA si areas and vegetated conveyances to the point where The shortest flow path from the r�JLop is at le Given the extremely low BU a upslop erties an adequate treatment is all eing provide in the nat development of the pro Untreatee ter runoff fr the bypass system will t same cs in terms 0 discharged into the buffer th he water quality will a compro g develoomen v occ intent o the Blue Diamond area draining to the bypass system ruption and ement. noff from the Blue Diamond property is e Blue Diamond property (28.8 acres) is Gres) upslope of the Blue Diamond h has approximately 7% BUA. The flows overland through wooded th site would intercept this water. & system inlet point. ength of the vegetated conveyances, we believe that ystem without having to build an engineered BMP prior to e Blue Diamond property discharged into the buffer from P e lity as untreated runoff from the same area or to development of the VA site. We believe that Blue Diamond stormwater management BMP until eman Rules will be satisfied. rmwater management will be required for their development. They are ion of the stormwater BMP be deferred until development of their property elopment of the property to begin moving forward is unknown, however cal Parkway in the fourth quarter of 2013 will be a primary catalyst for We believe that ,.g this varia quest is justifiable for the following reasons • It is a mino tion fro requirements of the Randleman Rules, since it only requests that implementation of the stormwate a plan be deferred until development of the Blue Diamond property. • Deferring imple f the stormwater management plan will not negatively impact surface waters. • The requirement fo lementation of the stormwater management plan prior to development of Blue Diamond property is not due to actions of Blue Diamond Investments, but rather due to development of the adjacent VA property. • The requirement for implementation of stormwater management prior to development of property is rare, and in this case only applies to Blue Diamond Investments and not to the upslope residential property owners, which are 13. 1 Blue Diamond Property Stormwater Management Variance Request September 27, 2013 Page 3 also contributors of runoff to the bypass system. It is in harmony with the general purpose and intent of the State's riparian buffer protection requirements and the Town's Ordinance and preserves its spirit. The public safety and welfare have been assured, water quality has been pro and substantial justice has been done. Thank you for your consideration of this variance request. Sincerely, 0 J. Neal Tucker, PE Stimmel Associates, PA Cc 13 Jeff Hunter, Pope Companies additional information.