REQUEST FOR CITY COUNCIL ACTION
DATE: 05/17/2023
TO: Honorable Mayor and City Council Members
FROM: Planning & Development Department
SUBJECT:
Title
PRECISE PLAN 2022-0004 TO REVIEW THE SITE PLAN, ARCHITECTURE, LANDSCAPING AND WALLS/FENCING ASSOCIATED WITH THE DEVELOPMENT OF A 52,423 SQUARE FOOT HEALTH CLUB FACILITY ON 4.09 ACRES LOCATED AT 2895 S. MAIN STREET, WITHIN THE QUASI-PUBLIC (QP) DESIGNATION OF THE MOUNTAIN GATE SPECIFIC PLAN (APPLICANT: JOSEPH BALBAS, BALBAS CONSTRUCTION, INC.)
End
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
This staff report asks the City Council to consider the recommendation by the Planning & Housing Commission to approve Precise Plan 2022-0004, which is the review of the site plan, architecture and other onsite design elements for the development of a 52,423 square foot health club on 4.09 acres. The project site is located at 2895 S. Main Street, which is at the northeast corner of Main Street and Chase Drive. The zoning of the property is Quasi-Public of the Mountain Gate Specific Plan which permits a health club in compliance with the development standards of the zoning on the property.
RECOMMENDED ACTION:
Recommended action
That the City Council:
a. Take no action, thereby affirming the Planning and Housing Commission’s action granting PP2022-0004, based on the findings contained in the staff report and conditions of approval.
OR
b. Set the item for review at a subsequent meeting.
Body
BACKGROUND & HISTORY:
The applicant proposes to develop the 4.09-acre site with a 52,423 square-foot, two-story health club facility. The site is located within the Quasi-Public (QP) designation of the Mountain Gate Specific Plan (SP89-01), and Office Professional (OP) designation of the South Corona Community Facilities Plan (SCCFP). The property is designated Office Professional (OP) in Corona’s General Plan Land Use Element. The zoning of the property permits a health club.
The property was previously occupied by a single-family residence with orchards. The home was recently demolished, and the orchard has been removed. Surrounding land uses include medical offices to the north, a flood control channel and water detention basin to the east, single family residential to the south across Chase Drive and single family residential to the west, across Main Street.
PP2022-0004 was reviewed by the Planning and Housing Commission on April 24, 2023, during a public hearing. The Commission received testimony from property owners in the nearby neighborhoods expressing concern with the project having driveway access on Chase Drive, the health club’s 24-hour operation and security in the evening hours and possible noise from the operation. It was noted at the meeting that all activities associated with the health club will be indoors and that the parking lot will have adequate lighting. A condition of approval was also added to the project that requires the applicant to provide an interior and exterior Safety and Security Operational Procedures Manual for the health club.
In conjunction with PP2022-0004, a variance application was processed to reduce the front yard setback on Chase Drive from 20 feet to 15 feet. The variance, V2022-0002, and PP2022-0004 were reviewed concurrently by the Planning and Housing Commission at its meeting on April 24, 2023, and were approved.
ANALYSIS:
Site plan
The health club building will be in the center of the property, surrounded by surface parking. The building size is 52,423 square feet and two stories. The project site will have vehicular access on Main Street, which will allow left-in, right-in and right-out turn movements. The second driveway on Chase Drive will allow full turn movements in and out of the site.
The building’s main entrance is oriented to the east within the internal portion of the site and on the opposite sides of Main Street and Chase Drive. The site will be graded at a lower elevation than the streets except for the northwest corner of the site, where the building pad and parking will be approximately 3 to 5 feet higher than Main Street. In other areas of the site, the building pad and parking lot will be approximately 11 feet lower than the elevation of Chase Drive and on average approximately 5 feet lower than the elevation of Main Street.
The front of the property is on Chase Drive and the street side yard is on Main Street. The Specific Plan requires a front yard setback of 20 feet and parking is not permitted in the front yard setback. The side yard setback is 10 feet and does allow parking in the setback. Per the applicant’s variance application, the front yard was reduced to 15 feet to accommodate parking spaces for the health club. The 15-foot wide front yard setback is landscaped, and the building is set back 84 feet from the property line on Chase Drive. Additionally, the project proposes a setback of 20 feet along Main Street, which includes a five-foot wide sidewalk and 15-foot landscape area. The building will be set back 93 feet from the property line on Main Street with parking located in between. Because of the site’s flag-shaped design, a narrow portion of the project site abuts the flood control channel to the east. Parking is located within this area with the building set back approximately 350 feet from the flood control channel.
Operations
The health club will offer a 24-hour operation with an anticipated 20 to 30 employees. The first floor of the club features the lobby area, free weights open area, wellness and tanning rooms, a cafeteria, retail and clothing area and a kids club, all for the convenience of the gym members. The second floor features the cardio area equipped with treadmills, stationary bicycles and other cardio equipment, a cycle room for spin classes, a multi-purpose room, restrooms, a boxing and martial arts area and a business office.
Parking
Corona Municipal Code (CMC) § 17.76.030 requires that a health club or fitness studio with a floor area greater than 3,500 square feet shall provide one (1) parking space per 150 square feet of floor area (1:150). However, CMC § 17.76.030 states that when there is a mixture of uses in a building, the parking requirement shall be the sum of the requirements for each individual use. The following table demonstrates the parking associated with the uses in the building. The proposed project requires 263 parking spaces, and the site is designed to provide 278 parking spaces.
Table A
Parking Requirement for Fitness Mania
|
Land Use |
Square Feet |
Parking Requirement |
Required No. of Spaces |
|
Health Club |
29,764 |
1:150 |
198 |
|
Office |
1,567 |
1:250 |
6 |
|
Tanning |
1,962 |
1:250 |
8 |
|
Wellness |
1,867 |
1:250 |
7 |
|
Laundry Facility |
90 |
1:250 |
1 |
|
Cafeteria |
3,282 |
1:100 |
33 |
|
Retail |
1,632 |
1:250 |
7 |
|
Daycare |
2,967 |
1 space per employee, plus 1 space per 10 children |
3 @ 1/employee |
|
Exterior walls, mechanical equipment room, elevator, stairways, and restrooms. |
9,292 |
No parking required per CMC § 17.04.258. |
|
|
|
|
Total Required: |
263 spaces |
|
|
|
Total Provided: |
278 spaces |
|
|
|
Surplus: |
15 spaces |
Architectural Style
The Mountain Gate Specific Plan includes architectural design guidelines to ensure quality architecture for commercial developments and requires that commercial buildings comply with the South Corona Community Facilities Plan’s architectural standards, which is Spanish Colonial. The building features various building materials typically associated with Spanish Colonial architecture such as pitched red tile roofing, arches, columns, porticos, recessed windows, decorative siding accents, white smooth plaster walls and overall wall reveals and trim.
The proposed building height of the health club facility is 36 feet, as measured from finish grade to the roof structure, excluding the parapet walls. Although Section 9.4 of the Mountain Gate Specific Plan establishes development standards for the QP District, it is silent with regards to building height. As a result, the City has deferred to Section 9.3 of the specific plan, “Commercial Development Standards”, which establishes a maximum height of 40 feet. This height limit is consistent with the property’s “OP” General Plan designation, all commercial zones in the citywide zoning code, and the height restrictions that were applied to the existing medical office buildings to the north, which are also in the QP District.
Lighting
The project includes parking lot lighting fixtures that are required to have hooded light fixtures to prevent glare impacts on the nearby residential properties. This complies with CMC § 17.84.070, which states that “all areas of exterior lighting shall be designed to direct light downward with minimal spillover onto adjacent residences, sensitive land uses, and open space.” Additionally, the surrounding area contains ambient lighting from existing street light poles along Main Street and Chase Drive; and lighting from the adjacent medical office development to the north, church to the southwest, and nearby residential developments. The project’s lighting is not expected to be a nuisance to the area.
Landscaping, Perimeter Fencing and Walls
The Conceptual Landscape Plan features a variety of 24-inch and 36-inch box shade trees, large screen shrubs, a variety of groundcovers and colorful plant materials to accent the site with an overall coverage area of approximately 23%. Additionally, the interior parking lot area will be shaded by tree canopies.
Split face walls, seven (7) feet in height, with decorative caps and pilasters are proposed along the eastern property lines adjacent to the water detention basin. A 3.5-foot-high wrought iron fence with decorative split face pilasters is proposed above split face retaining walls along the southern portion of the west perimeter, northern perimeter and the portion of the eastern perimeter that abuts the flood control channel.
Public Right-of-Way Improvements
The project requires public right-of-way (ROW) improvements to include the widening of the east half of Main Street up to 45 feet from the street centerline to street curb line, for an overall right-of-way width of 100 feet. The applicant is required to construct a 14-foot-wide raised center median, two northbound lanes, curb and gutter, and a 10-foot-wide parkway, which includes a 5-foot-wide sidewalk. The raised center landscaped median will have a southbound left-turn pocket, which will allow vehicles to make a left turn from Main Street into the project driveway. However, the required raised median will prohibit vehicles from making left-out turns from the project driveway onto Main Street. Only right-out turns will be allowed. Additionally, the northbound lanes on Main Street south of Chase Drive will be restriped to allow for a left-turn lane, a through lane, and a shared through/right-turn lane.
The north half of Chase Drive will also be widened up to 20 feet from the street centerline to street curb line, for an overall right-of-way width of 84 feet. The widening will allow for the construction of one westbound lane, curb and gutter, and a 24-foot-wide parkway, which includes a 4-foot-wide sidewalk. As there is no raised median required on Chase Drive, vehicles will be able to make full turn movements in and out of the project driveway on Chase Drive.
FINANCIAL IMPACT:
The applicant paid the application processing fees of $18,687.14 to cover the cost of the Precise Plan.
ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS:
Per Section 15070(b) of the State Guidelines for Implementing the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and Section 6.02 of the City’s Local Guidelines, a Mitigated Negative Declaration was prepared for the project since the Initial Study identified that the project’s potentially significant effects to the environment are capable of being mitigated to less than significant. Therefore, based on the project mitigation measures identified in the Mitigated Negative Declaration, there is no substantial evidence, in light of the whole record before the City, that the project may have a significant or potentially significant effect on the environment.
PLANNING AND HOUSING COMMISSION ACTION:
At its meeting of April 24, 2023, the Planning and Housing Commission considered the subject matter and took the following action:
Motion was made, seconded (Alexander/Sherman) and carried unanimously, with Commissioner Woody absent, that the Planning and Housing Commission adopt the Mitigated Negative Declaration and Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Plan and adopt Resolution No. 2608 granting PP2022-0004, based on the findings contained in the staff report, the conditions of approval and added conditions of approval. The minutes of the Planning and Housing Commission meeting are included as Exhibit 4.
PREPARED BY: JOANNE COLETTA, PLANNING & DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR
Attachments:
1. Exhibit 1 - Locational and zoning map
2. Exhibit 2 - Site plan for PP2022-0004
3. Exhibit 3 - Planning and Housing Commission staff report
4. Exhibit 4 - Draft minutes of the Planning and Housing Commission meeting of April 24, 2023