Planning Commission recommends Altadena park

Long after the sun went down, the planning and zoning commission and a crowd of residents were still discussing the proposed park at the former Altadena Valley Country Club.

Due to other cases on the agenda, the commission did not begin the hearing for the park's annexation and rezoning until 8:30 p.m. It was 10:30 p.m. when they voted to recommend that the city council move forward with the plan.

The park proposal includes about 19 acres of passive recreation, such as trails, picnic areas, disc golf, a playground, dog park and general green space. The possibility of a canoe launch into the Cahaba River and a fishing pond were also mentioned. The active area of the park includes baseball, soccer and football practice fields located in the property's floodplain.

Besides the park acreage, the rest of the former country club is planned for 66 single family homes on a private, gated streets and some lots to be rezoned to B-2 General Business District. The remainder would be zoned agricultural and remain undeveloped. David Stovall of Engineering Design Group represented the developers and said that there are no current plans to develop the B-2 lots into commercial properties, but they could have mixed uses in the future.

Commission member Lyle Larson said the committee had received numerous letters of opposition to the project. The Cahaba River Society also requested that no fill dirt would be placed in the floodplain and drainage plans to follow best practices above and beyond required standards.

The top concern of the night was traffic, as the first proposal for the park included an access point on Lakeland Trail, a residential street. Several residents voiced their concerns that added homeowners and park visitors would congest Lakeland Trail and make the nearby S-curve on Acton Road more dangerous and crowded, as well as produce cut-through traffic.

Traffic engineer John Anthony presented results of his traffic study, which included traffic counts along Acton Road at the I-459 ramp, Camp Horner Road and Lakeland Trail. He also studied traffic at Veteran's Park in Alabaster, which is slightly larger than Altadena but has similar amenities.

Anthony found that weekdays between 4:30 and 8:30 p.m. and Saturday mornings and early afternoons will peak traffic times for the Altadena development and numbers will increase over multiple construction phases. He recommended installing a light and turn lanes at the Acton-Lakeland intersection and retiming other lights on Acton, predicting that these changes would almost cancel out the effect of added traffic.

"With these adjustments, we can make this work," Anthony said.

The commission and residents expressed concerns about the traffic study and its growth projections, since Alabaster has a lower population density and the study did not account for possible future commercial traffic on the site.

In his presentation of the project, city manager Jeff Downes noted that property owners on the west end of the park have been initially positive toward building an access point on that side, which is closer to 459 and farther from residences. There is no agreement in place yet, but both he and Anthony agreed this was the "premium solution" for local residents and park visitors.

"Our goal would be to pursue this with the highest degree of enthusiasm," Downes said.

Other traffic concerns from the audience included school traffic, new construction like the Altadena Square Apartments and frequent accidents on the curve of Acton Road. Several residents supported using part of the Altadena property to straighten out that curve, which Downes had said could be a long-term option prior to the meeting.

Commission member Bill Visintainer said commercial properties are "not viable" without a straightened Acton Road, but noted that the developers' efforts will address their own effects on traffic. Larger issues of Acton Road cannot be solved by one project.

"They're taking incremental steps to address incremental issues," Visintainer said.

Drainage of the athletic fields was also discussed, as a city study of the property found it floods at least once a year. A representative of Goodwyn, Mills and Cawood said the fields will include specialized areas underground to hold excess water and let it slowly seep into the soil. They plan to adhere as closely to the River Society's demands as possible, though there will be some fill dirt in a few acres of the floodplain.

Bathrooms on the site will be bare and designed to withstand flooding and be easily cleaned, but there will be no other structures in the athletic field area.

Many existing pine trees on the property will be maintained and the plan calls for a buffer of 60-100 feet between residences and parking areas, which several residents said were inadequate. Lighting on the fields will be similar to lights in use at Liberty Park and Cahaba Heights athletic fields, which direct the light away from residences.

The commission ultimately voted to recommend the plan to the council with the recommendation that developers try to follow the River Society's requests. They also required that any plans to build a gas station, fast food restaurant, service station or home improvement center on the B-2 commercial lots must come back before the commission for approval.

The council will decide whether to go forward with the annexation and rezoning by Sept. 28. If approved, Downes said the passive parts of the park could be open in 2017, with other phases following as the budget allows.

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