By Noelle Edwards
nedwards@salisburypost.com
The Salisbury Planning Board voted Tuesday that a condition attached to the Gables at Kepley Farm did not require a second entrance to the development, only a traffic study to determine if a second entrance was necessary.
The board determined the condition has been met.
The condition required that a traffic study be done by the city after a certain amount of the property had been developed to determine if a second entrance to the subdivision was needed.
The issue went to a Planning Board committee because there was confusion over whether the study had been done and whether the condition actually required a second entrance or just a study of whether a second entrance was needed.
The committee, made up of planners Bill Wagoner, Tommy Hairston and Mark Beymer, looked at the history of the plans to try to figure out how the condition was introduced and whether its requirements had been met.
Wagoner, presenting the committee’s findings, said Planning Board minutes from June 2003 did not mention the condition.
City Council minutes from a week later show that the Planning Board approved the plan with 100 lots and said after those lots were developed, the site should be reviewed again to see if a second entrance was necessary. At that point, there still was no condition.
Planning Board minutes from September 2005 also showed no condition. The board revisited the plan at that point to approve phases to the plan.
Minutes show City Council approved the phases that same month. The condition was then added, after the council meeting but before the mayor signed the plan.
The committee said Jim Burgess, the developer, received a memo from planning staff to add the condition, so he did it.
Nowhere did the committee find the condition required a second entrance, only that a study be conducted to see if a second entrance was necessary.
And that was done. After 50 lots were developed, city staff did a traffic study of the development equivalent to those done elsewhere in Salisbury.
The staff also did a study based on full development of the land and found that, even then, residents would make only about 1,000 trips per day. Department of Transportation standards allow for up to 1,700 trips a day with one entrance.
Wagoner said there are about 260 lots in the development.
He also said even if more lots are developed, the condition does not require another study.
Around 21 residents attended the July 28 Planning Board meeting, most urging that the second entrance be required.
However, about 30 residents came to Tuesday’s meeting and showed their support for the board’s decision.
The Planning Board voted 9-0 that the condition for a traffic study had been met. Beymer and Hairston were absent from the meeting.
The issue now goes to City Council and will be on its Aug. 18 agenda.