Comment/Suggestion Sample Clauses

Comment/Suggestion. Some streets have high-speed geometries and are auto-oriented reducing the pedestrian-friendliness of the environment. Strategic reductions in travel speeds, reductions in building setbacks, and impediments to alternative transportation are opportunities to reduce auto trips and improve the environmental performance of the site. Response/Revision: To address the issue of high-speed geometries, the following amendments were made: Block sizes were reduced and the road network was reconfigured to parallel the existing urban grid system. Building setbacks were eliminated where possible. In many cases, buildings start at the right-of-way line. On-street parking is viewed as a traffic calming device and component integral to an urban pedestrian streetscape. Xxxxxx has committed to pursuing on-street parking on all streets other than 17th Street within the development. 17th Street is the exception because initial discussions with GA-DOT and traffic engineers have identified the area around the lake and park as the only appropriate section of 17th Street to accommodate on-street parking. The maximum-posted speed limit on the streets within the Atlantic Steel Redevelopment will be 35 mph. This is in accordance with City of Atlanta requirements and design standards. 16th and 17th Streets are the only streets that will have this maximum posting. All other streets will have a maximum posted speed limit of either 25 or 30 mph.

Comment/Suggestion. The best pedestrian environments consist of well-defined spaces, continuous uses and a variety of streetscaping amenities. From this perspective, the site plan, particularly the west side, can be improved by better framing pedestrian areas and creating clear progressions of pedestrian-oriented uses - such as a clear line of pedestrian oriented retail along key pedestrian routes. The current retail is discontinuous in places and, in these places, does not promote a defined pedestrian route or set of routes. Other pedestrian-friendly improvements can also be made such as avoiding uses incompatible with pedestrian activity, such as surface parking lots along pedestrian routes. Increased attention to these important details of the site plan will enhance the attractiveness of pedestrian travel as a viable mode of transportation. Response/Revision: The site plan, particularly the west side, has been altered to better frame the pedestrian areas by creating clear progressions of pedestrian-oriented uses. Pedestrian-oriented retail has been added to the west side along 16th Street and around a new public plaza at the heart of the technology park (as depicted in the original design), now a reconfigured and newly defined “Tech Village.” Independent of the defined pedestrian route system along the community’s streets, a secondary pedestrian route system is defined through a series of parks and plazas, not only linking the various uses within the redevelopment, but also linking the adjoining neighborhood to the south. A particular element represented in the DPZ alternative plan, the park which connects to the neighborhood via a north-south alignment, is represented in the amended site plan along State Street. The alignment delineated by the DPZ plan occurs in land owned by the Georgia Tech Foundation and not under Xxxxxx control. Xxxxxx fully expects the Georgia Tech Foundation to develop its land in a manner that complements the overall site plan, but cannot commit to creation of a park on Georgia Tech Foundation property. All surface parking lots along pedestrian routes have been removed, with the exception of on-street or plaza parking.

Comment/Suggestion. Parking has a major effect on travel behavior. Recent work cited by DPZ suggests that co-locating hotels and offices allows for shared parking and reductions in needed capacity as high as 25%. By locating the two hotels next to one another this opportunity is precluded. Preserving these and other opportunities for innovative parking arrangements makes sense for future traffic management. Response/Revision: In the amended site plan, hotels are relocated adjacent to offices to allow shared parking. Parking decks on the western side of the development are located adjacent to the railroad as suggested in the DPZ plan to provide better pedestrian environments along the street. The revised site plan capitalizes on many of the opportunities outlined in the site analysis (see Appendix G). Although Xxxxxx is not obligated to construct the revised site plan depicted in Appendix D, the Atlantic Steel TCM application does contain specific site design performance measures which the redevelopment must meet. The site design measures in the TCM application allow flexibility to make changes to the site plan during build-out while guaranteeing that some key site design features will be included regardless of what the final design looks like.