Warsaw Plan Commission Monday discussed a zoning ordinance amendment for the city's commercial buildings.
The commission has discussed, for the past six months, updating the city's zoning ordinance for commercial structures.
City Planner Jeremy Skinner wrote the zoning ordinance that will need to be approved by the commission at its December meeting. The ordinance also will need to be approved by the Warsaw City Council.The ordinance includes defining a large retail sales establishment as a structure greater than 65,000 square feet.
The ordinance also includes a section on eight development plan design standards for commercial zoning districts in the city.
Commission member Joe Thallemer said he supported the ordinance.
"I like that the ordinance has more restrictive covenants for developers, but is broad enough to give them options and encourages architectural integrity," Thallemer said.
The ordinance states all facades visible from adjoining properties or public streets must include pleasing scale features of the building and encourage community integration by featuring characteristics similar to a front facade.
All sides of a building that directly face a public street must feature at least one customer entrance.
Facades greater than 100 feet must project a minimum of 4 feet in depth and a minimum of 20 feet within each 100 feet of facade length.
Windows, awnings, entry areas and arcades must total at least 60 percent of the facade length facing a public street.
Building facades must include a repeating pattern that includes no less than three of the following elements: color change, texture change, material module change or expression of architectural or structural bay through a change in plane no less than 12 inches in width.
"This rule eliminates one-colored buildings and introduces textures and colors," Skinner said.
Roof lines must provide variations to reduce the massive scale of these structures and add visual interest. Roof lines must have a change in height of 100 linear feet in the building length.
Parapets, mansard roofs and gable roofs must be used to conceal flat roofs and rooftop mechanical equipment from public view. Alternating lengths and designs may be acceptable and can be addressed during the development plan.
Each building or tenant space must be clearly defined, with a highly visible customer entrance with a minimum of three of the following features including canopies, porticos and overhangs.
Predominant exterior building materials must be of high quality including brick, wood, limestone, other native stone and tinted or textured concrete masonry units.
Smooth-faced concrete block, tilt-up concrete panels or prefabricated steel panels are prohibited.
Facade colors must be of low reflectance, subtle, neutral or earth tone colors. The use of high-intensity, metallic, black or fluorescent colors is prohibited. Building trim may feature brighter colors than facade colors, but neon tubing is prohibited.
The commission also discussed materials for constructing downtown buildings.
Commissioner Richard Keeven said he did not think all downtown buildings needed to be brick. He said he was concerned with wood that deteriorates on the buildings and then is not kept up.
Skinner said he will talk to Warsaw Community Development Corp. Executive Director Carmen Lock about her thoughts on materials that should be allowed when constructing buildings in downtown.
Thallemer said the commission should refer to the HyettPalma study and see the plans for downtown buildings. The study was conducted in 2002 at the request of the city for the firm to determine areas needed to be revitalized in downtown.
"We want to maintain a blueprint for success in our downtown buildings, but we also don't want to eliminate the creativity of people who construct our downtown businesses," Thallemer said.
Commissioners include Tom Allen, Tammy Dalton, Jim Gast, Lacy Francis, Keeven and council representatives Jeff Grose and Thallemer.
