City planning commission approves site plans for three projects
Jan. 11—A storage facility to be built on the north side of Frederick will move forward after the approval of its final site plan by the Frederick Planning Commission.
The site plan unanimously approved by the commission at a meeting Monday night calls for the demolition of the existing single-story, 71,800-square-foot building known as the Plantronics building, according to a report prepared by city staff and the construction of a 120,460-square-foot, four-story self-storage facility.
The building was bought by the Frederick County Board of Education in 1990, which renovated it to use for both storage and office uses.
When the Board of Education moved to its current location on East Street, the county became the owner of the building and sold the property to Freedom Court LLC in 2013.
The building is currently used for storage and parking for some county vehicles.
The building's owners will have to get a permit from the Maryland Department of the Environment for the demolition because of the likely presence of asbestos, according to the staff report.
The commission also approved a request to modify the parking requirements for the facility to better fit its use.
While the property is zoned as a warehouse property, its use as a self-storage facility will require it to accommodate box trucks, moving vans, and other vehicles smaller than full-size trucks, Andrew Welker, the property's owner, told the commission.
The Planning Commission also unanimously approved a final site plan for a parcel of land in the Riverside Technology Park.
The plan's approval clears the way for the construction of two commercial buildings with a total of 103,200 square feet for office, warehouse and retail uses on the 10-acre parcel in the Riverside Technology Park.
The commission also approved a modification to lighting specifications included in the city's land management code to prevent spillover of light onto nearby properties.
While the tech park property could not eliminate all light spillage, the property is surrounded by a Wells Fargo office complex, a self-storage facility and two other lots in the tech park.
"There are no adjacent residential land uses areas, and all site lighting is downward oriented," said a letter from the project's designer at the design firm of Harris Smariga. "Areas of light spillage are minimal, and these adjacent areas are already lighted by existing pole lights as shown on the site plan."
The commission also unanimously approved a final site plan for a project that would build two fast food restaurants along Frederick's Golden Mile.
The plan's approval will allow the construction of a 3,423-square-foot commercial building to hold two fast-food restaurants in a parking lot of the Frederick Shoppers' World shopping center 1275 W. Patrick St. One of the restaurants will have a drive-thru lane.
The development will align with a project to improve transportation along the Golden Mile.
The city will soon begin design for the Golden Mile Multimodal Access project, which will feature a bus lane and a 10-foot-wide shared use path along westbound West Patrick Street.
The Shoppers' World project will build a ramp from the right-of-way into the site and a 5-foot-wide sidewalk along the western side of the property to provide pedestrian access.
Follow Ryan Marshall on Twitter: @RMarshallFNP
