Because of the town election on Tuesday, Nov. 3, the usual day for the town board’s work session and the planning board’s regular meeting, both have been delayed to Thursday, Nov. 5, with the usual times, 5:30 p.m. for the town board and 7:30 p.m. for the planning board.
The planners will consider the requests for two subdivisions. One is a repeat of the Tryon subdivision on Copper Beech Lane case which was approved in the summer of 2014 but remanded back to the town after adjacent landowners, Frank and Olga McCoy filed suit against the town. This will be a legislative hearing – anyone can speak – because it is a rezoning request tied to a request to approve the subdivision’s master plan.
The second will be a quasi-judicial hearing with sworn testimony by competent speakers because it is a request to approve a 22-lot plan for a subdivision master plan to be called High Point Bluffs. It will connect to both the Deacons Ridge subdivision via Ledgerock Road and the Cardinal Hills subdivision via Cardinal Crest Lane. Both streets will end in cul-de-sacs in the new subdivision, cul-de-sacs separated by a gully, Dunn Creek and future greenway as well as sewer lines. On the south side, it sits atop a cut made for the N.C. 98 bypass.
The owner of the 12.76 acres for High Point Bluffs is Nancy Dameron of Raleigh; the applicant is JS Development Company of Raleigh; and the engineer is Curry Engineering Group from Fuquay-Varina. The zoning is consistent with the request, conditional use general residential 5. Senior Planner Charlie Yokley recommends approval with one condition that about 6.22 acres of open space for the greenway.
The Tryon request is a almost a copy of the one in 2014. WF Tryon plans to buy five tracts south of Copper Beech Lane – it has been paved, which is a difference from last year – and build 279 single-family lots and 136 townhouse lots on the 131.49 acres. Another difference is that the developer is now assured sewer service since the City of Raleigh reached an agreement about easements with two residents on the south side of Wait Avenue, Tony Gordon and Robert Cooper.
The Copper Beech Lane paving was done for easier access to the subdivision next door, Kings Glen, which, like Tryon, is being underwritten or developed by Greystone Development Group. Charles R. Walker III, one of the applicants is a senior vice president at Greystone. Both Tryon and Kings Glen are listed as “under development” on Greystone’s website along with two Raleigh projects, Club Villas at Wakefield Plantation and Olde Town.
There is still a demarcation of the watershed boundary line for the Wake Forest/Smith Creek Reservoir affecting 33 single-family lots in the northwest corner of the property, and the developers are asking to change the land contours so that runoff is diverted to Austin Creek rather than entering the reservoir, which is still designated as a water supply source and protected. If the land changes are not done those lots would have to be larger and there would be fewer because of the watershed rules.
Again the six conditions recommended by Yokley include that there be no filling of wetlands “until issuance of all required permits” and that the removal of the 7.92 acres from the Smith Creek Reservoir watershed “is subject to final approval of the stormwater management plan by the Town of Wake Forest Engineering Department.”
The packet for the planning board and town board members does include a memo from Tobias Hampson, an attorney with Wyrick Robbins Yates & Ponton who advises the planning board. He included Wake Superior Court Judge Donald W. Stephens order sending the matter back to the town and the minutes of the 2014 public hearing plus a transcript of the speakers’ statements.
Judge Stephens said he sent the decision back to the town for the board “to receive additional public comments and for consideration consistent with the procedures provided for such decisions.”
