Cedar Crest PUD On Broyles Street Gets Final Nod

FARMINGTON — Farmington Planning Commission last week accepted the final plat for Cedar Crest, the city’s first subdivision with a planned unit development zoning designation.

The City Council in April 2020 approved a request from Hampton Holdings Inc., to rezone 40.4 acres on Broyles Street from R-1, single- family residential, to a PDU zone for a project to include townhomes, duplexes and single-family homes, a total of 222 units.

Cedar Crest also will have a pool, pavilion, walking trail and playground as amenities for those in the subdivision. It has two detention ponds as part of its storm drainage system.

The f inal plat was approved by the commission on the condition Hampton Holdings meets all the comments noted by city engineer, Chris Brackett of Olsson, Inc., of Fayetteville.

Brackett will not sign off on the final plat until all conditions are met.

As part of the final plat, Hampton Holdings will make a payment of $88,800 in lieu of park land conveyance to the city. This fee is $ 600 per single- family lot for 74 lots and $300 for each multi-family lot for 148 duplex and townhome lots.

Commissioner Gerry Harris, noting the streets in the development are 27 feet wide “curb to curb,” wondered if the subdivision would have signs telling people they could not park on the streets.

A representative with the development group said the subdivision will have a property owners association and will have protective covenants. These include no vehicles will be parked overnight on the streets in the PUD, and lot owners and tenants have to provide sufficient off-street parking to accommodate vehicles used by the family, with the exception of brief social gatherings.

The covenants also state semi-trailer trucks or commercial vehicles will not be allowed to park in the development, either on the public streets or on privately owned lots. Boats or recreational vehicles have to be stored out of sight from the front of the property.

Commission Chairman Robert Mann said residents could call the city to complain if there is a problem with cars parking on the streets, since the streets will be city streets, and the vehicles could be a safety hazard.

In other action, the commission approved the preliminary plat for Hillcrest Subdivision, a development with 80 single-family lots on Highway 170. This plat originally was approved in September 2020, but the developer changed the storm drainage system, so it had to come back before the commission.

Last month, the commission tabled the preliminary plat at the recommendation of Brackett, who said the current drainage plan had deficiencies in the detention calculations.

Brackett, at the commission’s May 24 meeting, said the developer made the changes as requested to show the subdivision will meet the requirements for drainage.

Cody Sexton with Blew & Associates engineering firm said the detention pond will be a much larger pond to compensate for the development, but it also will help fix a flooding problem that occurs from the pond during rain events.

“This is our opportunity to fix the sins of the past,” Sexton said.

The preliminary plat includes a drainage easement agreement between Valley View Golf and EBL Investments to use a pond owned by the golf course as part of the storm drainage system.

Bart Bauer with EBL investments asked to pay money in lieu of street improvements along Highway 170.

After some discussion about this, the commission voted to allow the developer to pay money in lieu of street improvements but require him to install sidewalks along Highway 170 the length of the development.

The commission discussed at length a request from Mark Silva of Farmington to split 40 acres into four 5-acre lots on Bethel Blacktop road and two 10- acre lots on Jimmy Devault Road. Silva was asking for a waiver from the subdivision requirements.

Melissa McCarville, city business manager, said Silva could administratively ask for four lot splits, but because he was asking for five lot splits, the request would have to be approved by the commission as a waiver to the subdivision requirements.

In a memo to the commission, McCarville recommended approving the request on the condition the commission require Silva to pay in lieu of installing improvements along Bethel Blacktop and Jimmy Devault as required by the subdivision ordinance.

“We can’t keep approving developments without requiring improvements,” McCarville told the commission.

The commission approved two motions to amend Silva’s request: one to require him to dedicate right-of-way on both Jimmy Devault and Bethel Blacktop roads to the city and the second to require the developer to pay in lieu of street improvements as required by the subdivision ordinance.

Mann asked Silva if he wanted the commission to table the request to determine what the costs would be for the street improvements, but Silva said he would just pull his request.

“There’s no way I’m going to do this,” Silva said. “The cost would be astronomical.”

He said he would either request to split the land into four lots administratively or look at the possibility of a “full-scale development.”

The last item on the commission’s agenda went quickly. The commission approved a conditional use permit for the sale of fireworks for Hale Fireworks Central Arkansas at 120 N. Holland St.