Photo by Joanne Beck.
After making additional tweaks to their blueprint of a new Burger King location on the city’s southwest side, site engineer Peter Sorgi and his team were encouraged Tuesday by the progress being made in Carrols Corporation’s incremental steps toward approval, he says.
“We reduced some of the pavements and some of the drive aisles, which increased the landscaping, and we also reduced some parking, which increased the landscaping, which is a direct result of the comments of this board. So, more green space, less pavement,” Sorgi said after the city’s Planning and Development Committee meeting. “And the other change I made was a right in or right out on Main Street, no left either way. And our initial plan had left both ways. So, again, it was working with the board to get that understanding. We have (the Zoning Board of Appeals) for two variances and then back here for site plan. We've been very happy with the comments. It's a better plan than it was when we started, and that's the process.”
He expects to be attending the ZBA’s meeting in September and then back to the planning committee with “our whole engineered site plan and all the landscape plans” in November for the beginning of a formal site plan review. That would most likely leave construction for the spring of 2024, he said.
Sorgi and site engineer Patrick Mahoney reviewed those updated plans before a slightly different committee — alternate Jim Krencik sat in for Ed Flynn, who was absent. During the last meeting, Flynn raised concerns about the skewed ratio of pavement to landscaping, preferring and recommending to see more green space and taking issue with a 17-foot lane, which he said he felt was excessive.
“Right now, I may be the only one talking about the 17-foot excessive lane over here, but I want more landscaping along Lyon Street,” Flynn had said.
No one seemed to have a problem with the updated landscaping; however, member David Beatty questioned the right-turn exits.
"Have there been any traffic studies done … that would show how this actually works? In reality, I mean, you've got a situation where people get their food, and they're going to be either going out to West Main, right? Or they can go all the way around to Lyon Street. Are there any studies that would show you how many people would go one way or the other, for instance?” he said.
There haven’t been any such specific studies, Sorgi said. That would come up along with the state Department of Transportation environmental review, he said. Mahoney added that it’s not unusual to have both a side and front exit and to provide a sign, “which we would be willing to do, saying exit to south Lyon with an arrow direction.”
“I still think it is somewhat problematic,” Beatty said.
Code Enforcement Officer Doug Randall asked if they were expecting the trip count to change with the new Burger King location at the corner of South Lyon and West Main streets. Mahoney estimated that it could go up at least 10 percent with increased visibility. That being said, he also doesn’t believe that folks are going to bypass other Burger Kings just to visit this new one, he said.
Real Estate Manager Doug Beachel spoke on behalf of the company, representing “1,100 of these throughout the East Coast,” he said.
“Typically, we do cell phone analysis that shows a heat map in terms of where they're coming from in the city of this size,” he said. “You know, most of your business is within five miles, they’ll show us where your outliers are, and then it’ll kind of take the highs and lows … it’s really, you know, three to five miles max.”
Beachel was there as the new real estate manager and said that things have been moving too slowly up to now. He would be part of the process to ensure it would be more swift, he said.
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