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PC: Consideration of a Zoning Code Text Amendment, P2018-0186-ZCA, Amending the Zoning Code as it Relates to the Standards and Requirements for Electric Vehicle Parking, Compact Parking, and Relaxed Parking Requirements Approved by Council Resolution in Culver City Municipal Code (CCMC) Chapter 17.320 - Off-Street Parking and Loading
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Meeting Date: September 26, 2018
Contact Person/Dept: Gabriela Silva, Associate Planner;
Michael Allen, Current Planning Manager
Phone Number: (310) 253-5736 / (310) 253-5727
Fiscal Impact: Yes [] No [X] General Fund: Yes [] No [X]
Public Hearing: [X] Action Item: [] Attachments: [X]
Public Notification: (Email) Master Notification List (08/29/18); (Posted) City website (08/29/18); (Published) in Culver City News (08/23/18)
Department Approval: Sol Blumenfeld, Community Development Director (09/18/2018)
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RECOMMENDATION
Staff recommends that the Planning Commission adopt Resolution No. 2018-P008 (Attachment No. 1) recommending to the City Council approval of Zoning Code Text Amendment P2018-0186-ZCA related to off-street parking.
PROCEDURES
1. Chair calls on staff for a brief staff report and the Planning Commission poses questions to staff as desired.
2. Chair opens the public hearing, and receives comments from the general public.
3. Chair seeks a motion to close the public hearing after all testimony has been presented.
4. Commission discusses the matter and arrives at its decision.
BACKGROUND
Recent trends in mobility have necessitated changes to the City's parking requirements. These proposed changes include establishing new standards for Electric Vehicle (EV) charging stations and bicycles, increasing parking efficiency by reducing stall dimensions and where appropriate waiving a portion of the parking requirement altogether. Currently, within the Transit Oriented Development (TOD) District, the Council may waive by resolution a portion of the project parking based upon proximity to alternative transit, and within the parking deficient Hayden Tract and Smiley Blackwelder areas the City has established more flexibility to allow for compact parking and other alternative parking measures. However these standards do not apply citywide.
Therefore the following modifications to off-street parking requirements are recommended:
1. Establishment of minimum requirements for EV charging stations at off-street parking spaces. Currently, only projects that are subject to the Residential Mandatory Measures (Chapter 4) and Nonresidential Mandatory Measures (Chapter 5) of the California Green Building Standards Code are required to provide EV infrastructure to facilitate future installation of EV chargers, but not actual charging stations. Further, the current requirements do not serve the desired goal of accommodating and promoting a shift in technology patterns towards electric vehicle use.
2. Establishment of citywide compact parking requirements in Section 17.320.025 - Alternative Parking Provisions, as one (1) of various options for increasing the provision of parking within the City's two (2) Hayden Tract and Smiley Blackwelder Parking Districts, which were identified as being parking impacted. Within these districts a maximum of thirty percent (30%) of the total required off-street parking may be provided as compact spaces, which must measure a minimum of 7'-6" wide by 17'-6" in length.
3. Establishment of relaxed citywide parking requirements on a project specific basis by Council resolution. Currently, only projects within the TOD District may apply for requests for reduce parking on the basis of a shared parking analysis, through resolution by the City Council, per CCMC Section 17.400.065 - Mixed Use Development Standards. Further, such requests would only be allowed as part of a mixed-use project within the TOD District. These current allowances were adopted by the City on January 8, 2018 and were brought forth as part of the recommendations of the TOD Visioning Study. However, as alternative transportation options expand throughout the City, such provisions for parking reductions would be suitable citywide and as part of projects other than mixed-use.
4. Establishment of more extensive bicycle parking requirements, which will be presented at a later date as a separate item. Current Zoning Code requirements for bicycle parking have proven to be deficient in achieving the active mobility goals of the City. Therefore, staff has undertaken research on this subject, in order to create standards that reflect the desired goals, consistent with the direction of the Planning Commission. Staff has also been working in collaboration with the Public Works Department to obtain feedback from the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee (BPAC) and the Bicycle and Pedestrian Action Plan, which will also ensure efforts are synergistic.
ANALYSIS/DISCUSSION
Electric Vehicle (EV) Parking
Research of other jurisdictions code requirements showed that many still did not have specific requirements for EV parking and EV charging infrastructure, or had minimal requirements, which are summarized in Table 1 of Attachment No. 2. This table includes the minimum required standards from the 2016 California Green Building Standards Code, which only require "EV capable" or "EV ready" spaces, which only requires the infrastructure capable of supporting future EV supply equipment, but does not require the actual charging station(s). A desire to go further from these minimum standards in order to promote sustainability and alternative fuel technology has been identified as an objective for the City through feedback from the Planning Commission, City Council, and general public. For the jurisdictions that had adopted standards, requirements varied, as summarized below. Few required actual charging stations, but those that did ranged widely in the quantity of stations required, from approximately two percent (2%) up to ten percent (10%) of required parking spaces, with supplemental EV ready required at approximately four (4) to twenty (20) percent. Based on these ranges, the resulting approximation for each type of EV space is 12% for EV ready stalls and 6% for stalls with EV charging stations.
Further, based upon this research and recent approvals from Planning Commission, the proposed Zoning Code Amendment proposes to require EV parking as shown in Table 2 of Attachment No. 2. Residential developments of four (4) or more units would be required to provide one (1) full EV charging station per unit plus a minimum of one (1) guest space up to ten percent (10%) of the guest spaces, and one (1) EV ready space per unit plus a minimum of one (1) guest space up to twenty percent (20%) of the guest spaces. Non-residential developments would be required a minimum of one (1) full EV charging station up to five percent (5%) of the required vehicle parking spaces, and minimum of one (1) additional EV ready space up to ten percent (10%) of the required vehicle parking spaces.
The proposed standards conform with surveys of other jurisdictions and the amendment is consistent with recent project approvals and goes beyond the rate of 6% EV ready stalls required as a condition of approval for a recent food retail project, which mirrored the Green Building Code requirement. 1 Three (3) additional projects within the transit-oriented development district and downtown also provided charging stations as part of the conditions of approval.2 .
Compact Parking
The Zoning Code currently only allows compact parking in the Hayden Tract and Smiley Blackwelder parking districts up to thirty (30) percent of the required parking and must measure 7'-6" wide by 17'-6" long. The survey of other jurisdictions shows compact space dimensions typically range from 7'-6" to 8'-6" in width by 15'-0" in length, with only one of the jurisdictions surveyed requiring 16'-0" in length (Attachment 2, Table 3). The survey also shows that where allowed, compact parking spaces are typically allowed for up to twenty (20) to forty (40) percent of the required parking. In some cases, the allowance is limited to certain uses or districts.
The previous Zoning Code (prior to the current 2005 Zoning Code) allowed compact parking for up to thirty percent (30%) for the first one hundred (100) spaces and up to forty percent (40%) of the remaining required off-street parking spaces, and the allowed dimensions for such stalls were 7'-6" in width by 15'-0" in length. The shift away from compact parking was due, in part, to the changing trends in automobile design and consumer preferences, but was also due to concerns that larger vehicles at the time were occupying more than one (1) compact stall and were encroaching into required drive aisles, thereby creating conflicts with internal circulation. Although it is desirable to accommodate smaller vehicles while providing a benefit of maximizing the amount of parking provided within a specified area footprint, the current Zoning Code eliminated compact parking provisions, which indicates allowances for this type of parking should be applied conservatively. However, new changes are now emerging as regulations and consumer preferences move towards more sustainable transportation options, less vehicle-centric living, and more fuel/energy efficient vehicles, which tend to be smaller-scale vehicles. Therefore, compact parking was reintroduced in a limited form within two parking districts, where parking is impacted.
As these emerging changes continue to grow, the City is reevaluating this subject on a citywide scale. Therefore, the amendment under consideration proposes to allow compact parking at the same dimensions specified for the two (2) current parking districts (7'-6" wide by 17'-6" in length) for non-residential uses only, for only up to twenty percent (20%) of the total required off-street parking. Excess parking will not be allowed to be provided as compact in order to prevent such parking from being used as required parking in the future and exceeding the 20% allowance. In addition, compact parking spaces will not be eligible for requests for further reductions in dimensions, such as through an Administrative Modification or other similar entitlement. By requiring a minimum length of 17'-6" for compact spaces, there will be no conflict with vehicles encroaching into the drive aisles, especially considering this is only six (6) inches shorter than the required standard stall dimensions (8'-0" wide by 18'-0" in length). In addition, compact spaces will also comply with the recently adopted striping standards of current CCMC subsection 17.320.035.I, which requires four-inch wide double stripes spaced six (6) inches apart, in order to address pedestrian access and vehicle door operation between vehicles.
Relaxed Parking Requirements Approved by Council Resolution
The TOD Visioning Study completed in 2017 recommended minimizing the amount of project parking within the TOD District in order to discourage auto use and encourage ridership on Expo. The Zoning Code establishes minimum required parking, but does not address a parking maximum. As part of Zone Text Amendment P2017-0239-ZTA and the adoption of a resolution, City Council amended the Mixed Use Standards and Community Benefits Established for the TOD District, including the relaxation and commingling of parking requirements on a project by project basis subject to City Council discretion, consistent with the City's mobility goals.
Bicycle Parking
The current Zoning Code standards require bicycle parking as a percentage of required vehicle parking at rates of five (5) and ten (10) percent for non-residential and multi-family residential uses respectively, and there are no separate requirements or distinction between short-term and long-term bicycle parking. In short, the current Zoning Code standards for bicycle parking are outdated. Staff uses standards from the City's Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan, which was adopted in 2010, rather than those within the CCMC.
The City's Public Works Department staff are working on the upcoming Bicycle and Pedestrian Action Plan (BPAP). The BPAP is in development and it is also intended to inform next steps with regard to future bicycle parking requirements and standards within the Zoning Code. In conjunction with Public Works staff, Current Planning Division staff will present research compiled, as well as preliminary draft bicycle parking requirements and standards to the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee (BPAC). Following input from the BPAC, staff will present a proposed Zoning Code Amendment related specifically to bicycle parking to the Planning Commission in the near future. This subject has been on the Work Plan and staff will bring the item forward separately in collaboration with the Public Works Department efforts on the BPAP and with the BPAC.
Some of the potential code related items that would be addressed, include:
* Adjusting ratios to be independent of vehicle parking requirements
* Establishing an expanded list of uses with individualized ratios
* Establishing short-term and long-term categories and associated requirements
* Establishing more specific locational requirements (e.g. distance to entries, sidewalk, etc.)
* Establishing more specific design requirements (e.g. racks, lockers, etc.)
* Establishing requirements for associated amenities (e.g. showers, etc.)
* Consideration of possible credits against vehicular parking requirements
SUMMARY
Zoning codes are a product of their times, and the current standards do not account for recent changes in technology, the emergence of alternative energy vehicles and changing parking needs. Therefore it is timely to modify the zoning provisions to implement new parking standards that reflect these changes to benefit the general public interest, safety, convenience and welfare of the City.
PUBLIC NOTIFICATION
CCMC Section 17.630.010 requires public notification via a publication in the Culver City News, a minimum of fourteen (14) days prior to the formal Public Hearing. Accordingly, a public notice was published on August 21, 2018. In addition, the public notice was posted on the City website and distributed electronically on August 29, 2018. As of the writing of this report, staff has not received any public comments, in writing or any other form, with regard to the proposed Zoning Code Amendment in response to the public notice.
ENVIRONMENTAL DETERMINATION
The proposed Zoning Code Amendment (P2018-0186-ZCA), to amend Zoning Code Chapter 17.320 - Off-street Parking and Loading, is considered exempt Pursuant to Section 15061(b)(3) of the California Environmental Quality Act, because it can be seen with certainty that there is no possibility that the Project will have a significant effect on the environment. The Project by itself, does not result in any physical changes in the environment because it will only amend the Zoning Code to require and allow certain types of parking as part of future development, and does not result in an intensification of development beyond what the Zoning Code already currently allows. Future projects incorporating the parking types specified by the proposed amendment will be reviewed individually pursuant to CEQA as may be applicable.
ATTACHMENTS
1. Draft Resolution No. 2018-P008, including Exhibit A: Proposed Zoning Code Text Changes in "strikethrough/underline" format
2. Parking Summary Tables
3. Mixed Use Development Zone Text Amendment P2017-0239-ZCA
MOTION
That the Planning Commission
1. Adopt Resolution No. 2018-P008 (Attachment No. 1) recommending to the City Council approval of Zoning Code Text Amendment P2018-0186-ZCA related to electric vehicle, compact parking, and required parking standards.
NOTES:
1. The requirement implemented on a recent office project with a fully automated parking structure, where the total number of parking spaces required was 212 and the number of charging stations required as a condition of approval was thirteen (13), approximately 6%, with a requirement that the project construct infrastructure necessary to allow for future installation of additional EV charging stations.
2. One provided only eight (8) EV ready spaces out of 1,521 required spaces, three (3) of which are required fully operations charging stations, and any additional EV ready spaces required by the Green Building Code; another was required to provide 6% EV ready stalls with 25% of those having fully operational charging stations; and the third project was required 6% EV ready stalls with 50% of those having fully operational charging stations. The proposed language is also consistent with a four (4) unit residential condominium project, where two (2) spaces were required per unit plus one (1) guest space; each unit was required to provide one (1) parking space equipped with a full EV charging station as was the guest parking space.
3. Endnote the CC Resolution approval for the MXD Ordinance changes to waive parking in the TOD.