The Highland Park Zoning Commission has delayed a decision on changes that would permit The Shops of Highland Park to install additional landscaping at the cost of some parking spaces and increase the shopping center’s height by 10 feet.
During its Aug. 26 meeting, the commission continued until Oct. 28 a public hearing on the shopping center’s rezoning so that staff and the center’s owner could work to refine its application. The zoning commission will ultimately make a recommendation to the Highland Park Town Council, which will vote on whether to approve rezoning the site.
Commission members asked questions about why the shopping center had requested a height increase when no additions are currently planned and whether the new zoning ordinance could be rewritten to require, instead of permit, landscaping in exchange for parking relief.
“Does this (planned development district) put more stringent requirements and control over the property?” asked commission member Jordan Wallace.
“Yes and no,” responded community development director Jeff Armstrong. “There are some that are more stringent, and some that are less stringent.”
Armstrong told the commission that some potential uses of the property that are now permitted would not be allowed under the new zoning. The zoning change would prohibit building construction in a portion of the rear of the property, as well as require that exterior lighting be directed away from the shopping center’s neighbors and that there be a solid fence or wall along the property line.
Planned improvements, including the addition of landscaping and burying of existing power lines, would beautify the area and increase the buffer between shops and nearby homes, explained Kenneth Pratt, managing partner of the shopping center’s owner Stockdale Investment Group.
“I’m not an outside developer looking at this property from a distance,” he said. “I along with my wife and two children live in Highland Park just a few blocks away. My parents also live within two blocks of the center. This is our neighborhood and our community too, and the positive impact of this proposal and its important gateway into the town matter deeply to me.”
Commission chair Ralph Perry-Miller commended Pratt for the proposal to bury utility lines but pointed out that the center’s ownership could change, and that a new owner might have different intentions for the site.
Perry-Miller asked Pratt whether he would consider requiring landscape improvements in exchange for parking relief and keeping the building’s current maximum height the same. Pratt said he was agreeable to addressing those concerns.
Armstrong said that town staff had sent notices of the proposed change, and that three properties had responded with opposition. The town had also received one letter of support from a local church.
Neighbor Laura Carlock told the commission that notice of the change was given while neighbors were out of town, and that more residents were against the rezoning.
“There are many people that are opposed to this,” she said. “I haven’t spoken to any neighbor that is for this.”
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