The Landscape is Changing

By this time next year, the local landscape will have a new look if the bevy of development proposals receives City Council approval.

Editor’s note:
On Thursday, July 28, 2022, the Peachtree Corners City Council denied the rezoning request for the Dilweg project.

The Town Center project was approved, and Council agreed with the Planning Commission’s recommendations.

The Sun Court project was also approved by Council, but there were some modifications to the Planning Commission’s recommendations.
The developer is required to work in conjunction with the city to determine the exact path of the trail system through the property. Also, within 30 days of the issuance of a land disturbance permit, the developer must contribute 50% of the base cost of a pedestrian crossing from the property to the Intuitive campus across Spalding Drive as part of the trail system expansion.

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There is nothing permanent except change. — Heraclitus

These words from a Greek philosopher who died more than 1,500 years ago ring as true now as they did then. And nobody knows that better than the residents, business owners and stakeholders of Peachtree Corners.

In his most recent newsletter, City Councilman Eric Christ pointed out that change in the city that just celebrated its 10th birthday is coming in droves.

Pay attention and speak up

“It’s summertime and many people are vacationing, going to the pool — in general paying less attention than normal to events around them,” Christ wrote. “I would encourage you to pay attention this summer as the combined impact of the proposed [mixed-use developments] MUDs (and there are most certainly even more coming that we don’t know about yet) will have a profound impact on the future direction of our community.”

During a recent Peachtree Corners Life podcast, Christ talked about how he keeps up with social media, and when misinformation is being shared, he often weighs in to set the record straight.

“Everybody is entitled to their own opinion about whether a particular project is beneficial to the city. But I think it’s important that …everybody has the facts,” he said. “And so, if we’re on Nextdoor, on Facebook — setting aside whether what they’re building is good or bad — if it’s not accurate, …on the size …or the number of units being developed, you often see me chime in and provide the facts.”

Christ said that during his first year in office, he was surprised that so many people he spoke to had no idea about items coming before the City Council.

“People need to, I want them to, know things are being voted on. Because if …no one shows up for a public hearing, I guess there are two …potential reasons,” he said. “One is no one politically cares about that particular development, they know it’s O.K., or they do care, but they didn’t know about the meeting.”

He added that City Council doesn’t always have the best ideas, and hearing from the community members is an important part of the process.

Info on upcoming project requests

“We’re seeing a lot of requests right now in the city to change from various types of commercial zoning to what’s called mixed-use development. And under our ordinance, mixed-use requires three or more different kinds of uses,” said Christ.

Mixed-use zoning can include residential, whereas commercial zoning does not. With housing shortages across the country, developers are looking for solutions like what’s going on up and down Peachtree Parkway or on Holcomb Bridge Road. They come up with lots of ideas for lots of different types of uses. But residents can’t live where it’s zoned commercial. It’s allowed to build a hotel on commercial property, but not a permanent residency.

“That’s why we’re seeing a lot of requests for residential developments,” he said.

Like most cities, Peachtree Corners has a Planning Commission comprised of members appointed by the City Council. They act as an additional filter of sorts, by making recommendations to City Council.

Christ talked about several major projects on the agenda for July.

The Forum at Peachtree Corners

The Forum has a mixed-use request to rezone 44 acres from commercial to allow for new mixed-use development at 5131 through 5185 Peachtree Parkway. Owner North American Properties (NAP) wants to include a 381-unit apartment building, retail space, a hotel and additional parking to the existing 99,050 square feet of office space and to reconfigure the existing 415,350 square-foot shopping center.

The Planning Commission recommended approval with certain conditions including:

■   The building permit for the apartments won’t be issued until the permit for the hotel is issued.

■   The developer must build a pedestrian bridge from the Peachtree Parkway Bridge to the hotel.

■   The developer must build a multi-use trail system through the property.

■   Buildings can’t be higher than 90 feet. Those located within 200 feet of existing residential properties can’t be higher than 50 feet.

■  There can be no drive-through businesses on the property.

•■   Business hours are to be limited, from 7 a.m. to midnight Monday through Thursday, and 7 a.m. to 2 a.m. on weekends, with the exception of coffee / bagel shops that may open 6 a.m. to 2 a.m. every day.

“When staff researched this, they discovered that The Forum was …zoned light industrial back in the day. So, in the late 90s, it was converted into …a mid-level commercial, and they did include a condition that there would be no hotels,” said Christ.

“So, North American Properties …has taken feedback from the community meeting and they’ve requested two changes. One is changing conditions to permit a hotel and the second is to rezone the 44 acres. That doesn’t actually mean that they’re going to redevelop every piece of that. That’s just how big it is. And they want to change its zoning from commercial to mixed-use, which is what the Town Center is zoned. So, [that includes] the restaurant and the retail and the movie theater and even the townhomes.”

Innovation Lofts

The project called Innovation Lofts, also owned by North American Properties, has requested to add 4.4 acres to the existing 20.6-acre Town Center mixed-use zoning district by rezoning 4.4 acres from commercial to mixed-use with an associated variance to allow for a new apartment building at 5246 Peachtree Parkway and 4936 Peachtree Corners Circle.

[Updated, Correction: The Community Development Department recommended approval with certain conditions on the Innovation Lofts proposal. At its July 19 meeting, the Planning Commission voted to deny the request. Because this was the first reading, City Council didn’t vote on the rezoning request. ]

Planning Department recommended conditions:

■   The site may be developed with up to 249 studio, one- and two-bedroom, multi-family units.

■   The developer must contribute $200,000 by Dec. 31 toward the construction of the Town Center Corners Connector Trail and other associated features in exchange for residential density credit.

■   The developer must construct a pedestrian bridge connecting its property to the Town Center.

■   The developer must provide sidewalk connectivity between all buildings and dedicated trails within the site and to all public streets adjacent to the site.

■   The property will have a resort-style swimming pool and courtyard, but no children’s playground equipment is allowed on the property.

The apartments versus condominiums question came up during a community meeting hosted by the United Peachtree Corners Civic Association. It’s obvious that under the previous owners, there were at least a dozen empty store fronts and North American Properties wants to build density on The Forum property. Popular opinion is that the residential with apartments has a better turnover, and that is a better for retail versus equity ownership.

“Tim Perry [Managing Partner of North American Properties] is looking to create a vibrant retail restaurant shopping center and maintain it,” said Christ. “We sometimes get bored with the same restaurants. …With apartment turnover every two or three years, you have new potential customers.”

Town Center

Another Town Center rezoning request is for a mixed-use office and retail development. The request is to add 2.31 acres to the existing 20.6-acre Town Center MUD zoning district by rezoning the 2.31 acres from commercial to mixed-use to allow for a new office and ground floor retail development at 3847 Medlock Bridge Road and 5100 Peachtree Parkway. The rezoning also includes the existing Piedmont Bank property.

The 5100 Peachtree Parkway property is currently occupied by the bank with associated parking located at the southeast corner of the intersection of Peachtree Parkway and Medlock Bridge Road. The 3847 Medlock Bridge Road property is a vacant parcel located behind the bank at the corner of Medlock Bridge and Town Center Drive. The property is directly next to the Town Center development, which is already zoned for mixed-use development.

The property was the subject of numerous past zoning cases. One was the rezoning in 2013 by the city to the current commercial district to allow for commercial/retail development. Previous requests for apartments, a gas station with auto repair and office buildings were never constructed.

The Planning Commission recommended approval with conditions that include:

■   Retail and/or restaurant use must be located on the ground floor of the office building.

■   The remnants of the former driveway to the bank site along Medlock Bridge Road must be fully removed. The sidewalk must be returned to standard condition and the unimproved yard area must be landscaped.

Sun Court

A foreign limited partnership out of North Carolina, according to its Georgia business license, has requested to rezone 9.68 acres from light industrial to mixed-use development to allow for a new mixed-use development at 2 Sun Court. The Sun Court project will consist of an existing four-story office building, a new mixed-use apartment building which will contain 170 residential units, ground-floor retail space and an extension to the public trail system.

The Sun Court property currently consists of a large office building and associated surface parking located near the southeast corner of the intersection of Spalding Drive and Engineering Drive. The site has some wooded areas remaining along its periphery; however, the remainder of the site is developed with the office building and parking lots. Access points exist on Spalding Drive and Sun Court.

The property does not include the International Charter Academy school located at the immediate corner of Spalding and Engineering.

The property is across Spalding Drive from the Intuitive Surgical corporate campus. Adjacent to the east along Spalding is the Peachtree Corners Post Office. To the south and west are additional Technology Park office park buildings.

The Planning Commission recommended approval of the request with conditions that include:

■   The property must retain the existing office building in its existing configuration, square footage and use.

■   A minimum of 4,935 square feet of retail and/or restaurant uses must be located on the ground floor of the apartment building. The entirety of the space must be occupied and operational (as evidenced by a business license) before a Certificate of Occupancy for the apartment building will be issued.

■   The trail must be completed before a Certificate of Occupancy for the apartment building will be issued.

Ensuring that the trail system be completed has been a major concern of City Council. “We’ve become pretty bullish on that, you know, on the trail system. We are starting on our master plan of 11 plus miles of trails, …the exact location and how we do it is starting to really kind of coalesce more than it did in the past to where we’ve now started to see exactly where we are going to weave it through some of these developments. And as a result, we’re requiring some of them to have the trail be part of their property,” said Christ. “I think this trail system is going to come to life a lot quicker than we thought it could have even as recent as a year ago.”

Changes are inevitable, so make sure they’re positive

At the end of the day, Christ reminds residents and businesses that Peachtree Corners can’t remain the same. “Change is one constant in the world. Peachtree Corners won’t remain static,” he said. “However, considering one of the main reasons we became a city was to, at a minimum, maintain our existing ownership to rental split, I have felt it very important to ‘walk the walk’ when it comes to doing just that.”

He added that all the projects that have come before City Council have had their merits. “But ultimately, the ones I voted against I didn’t believe had favorable prospects for being a long-term value creator for our community,” said Christ in his newsletter. “Just because something will be better than what is there right now, doesn’t mean we should vote to approve something.”

Similar sentiments were expressed by noted author Victor Hugo more than a century ago when he wrote, “Change your opinions, keep to your principles; change your leaves, keep intact your roots.”