Planning Commision Meeting

Just got back from this month's Planning Commission meeting where the main topic, in fact only topic, was the request by Dr. William Hamilton to rezone the strip of property on the north side of Black Diamond Drive, abutting West 13 from Professional Administrative to Planned Unit Development in order to put in apartment buildings. Last summer, Dr. Hamilton failed to convince the city council to give him a special use permit to put apartments in an area zoned for offices, so now he's requesting the city rezone the strip of land, the last undeveloped enterprise zone in the city, for apartments. In his presentation, Hamilton pointed out the property had sat undeveloped for years, he had been working with city staff to meet concerns and the apartments would increase the value of the property and thus tax revenue. The revised development would leave the area Black Diamond meets Steigal Road reserved for commercial development and a whole 20' buffer of native trees as a buffer between the apartments and the single family residences to the west.

Speaking in opposition were half a dozen residents of the nearly Woodland Hills subdivision, who complaining about the effect of Hamilton's apartment development on the south side of Black Diamond Drive, noise, lights shining into windows, increased traffic and the danger to children, especially with the apartments running right alongside eastbound Hwy. 13. The speakers referred several times to the pristine nature of the area and how the view had been ruined by the first set of apartment houses, not mentioning the fact that the development had already destroyed the pristine nature of the area when it had gone in 10 years ago. There were also some complaints about how,while Hamilton said he targeted students, single professionals and families as tenants, the advertising literature shown by the Woodland Hill residents appeared to specifically target SIUC students.

City staff advised the commsion to deny the application thought I didn't quite get why, and the commission voted deny it as well. One reason give for the vote against was the commission didn't want to see the last remaining undeveloped enterprise zone put to a residential rather than a business use.