Correction: According to City Clerk Michelle Ebbert, the proposed zoning map amendment affecting the U-Haul property at 1309 High Street passed a final reading on May 4. According to Ebbert, a third reading of the ordinance was waived on that date. Fort Atkinson Online understood the ordinance to have passed a second reading only. We regret the error.
By Kim McDarison
A proposed zoning map amendment, changing zoning for the U-Haul property on High Street from urban mixed use to planned unit development, garnered second-reading approval from the Fort Atkinson City Council on Tuesday.
A first reading of the amendment was approved by council during its meeting held April 20.
Ordinances, and amendments that change them, within the city of Fort Atkinson are subject to three readings unless council opts to waive future readings.
A third reading for the zoning map change will likely come during council’s next meeting.
The property undergoing the zoning change process is located at 1309 High St. and is the former site of a Kmart store which is being operated today by U-Haul. The property owner is looking to redevelop the site, Fort Atkinson City Zoning Administrator Brian Juarez said during the April 20 city council meeting.
According to information shared with council in April, changing the property from its current zoning of Urban Mixed Use to Planned Unit Development is required to accommodate the various uses that are being proposed for the property.
The adjustment process will also include approval of changes made to the site’s general development plan and the specific implementation plan, Juarez wrote in a memo to council shared at both the April 20 and May 4 meetings.
Juarez noted during the April meeting that the city’s Future Land Use Map, established as part of the city’s 2019 Comprehensive Plan, identified the U-Haul property as appropriate for planned mixed use. Such areas are intended to be vibrant urban places that function as community focal and gathering spots, he wrote.
The city’s Comprehensive Plan further identified the property for such mixed uses as commercial and residential buildings, including townhouses and condominiums.
“The proposed redevelopment of this site as a U-Haul storage facility does not align with these advisory development concepts,” Juarez wrote in his memo.
Describing in April the need for rezoning, Juarez said: “The planned unit development overlay creates a situation whereby the city can offer some additional flexibilities through rezoning.
“In exchange for that, the city has the ability to oversee this development process; they (U-Haul) do a little bit extra to make the area nicer, the neighborhood nicer, and work with the city in development to get an overall better product, and, at the same time, the city is able to give them some additional flexibilities in the zoning.”
As previously reported by Fort Atkinson Online, in April, Juarez, describing next steps, said: “If this goes through the three readings (required to make changes to ordinances and language that amends them) and was approved, then basically from there we would begin the final steps towards finalizing our implementation plan in new development. We would get the chance to have a say in everything from green space, to signage, to the aesthetics of the development.”
He added: “We all have ideas about what we think the highest and best use of that property would be in the long haul, whether or not we think that the storage is it or not, it is what we have currently available to us and it would make use of the property, so I think that this is certainly the best option for the city to pursue in quality development with that type of a use.”
“If for some reason this development does not move forward, the zoning is specific to this plan from U-Haul. So a different business could not take over the plan from U-Haul and move forward. They would have to apply for their own planned unit development zoning, and their own general development plan, and their own specific implementation plan,” City Manager Rebecca LeMire advised council in April.
“In addition to that, the planning commission is going to be the one having approval when it comes to the final implementation plans, so we will be seeing this process … there is the potential that if the city was not satisfied with something that was going on, we could simply say ‘no’ at that point,” Juarez said.
U-Haul trailers are stored in the parking area at 1309 High St. The former Kmart store was purchased by U-Haul. The owners would like to build a storage facility on the site. Changes to the city’s zoning map are required to accommodate the proposed use.
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