08/28/2006 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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• • The Preserve page 4 water quality on and off site. In addition, improving the wetlands through restoration of native vegetation will contribute to better water quality. h. Preserving the open space aesthetic to which community residences have become accustomed The project design minimizes impacts on wetlands and actually improves the wetlands, which will be protected with a management plan. i. Maintaining natural buffer between established and new developments. The large wetlands along the eastern part of the site will remain as an open space buffer for existing development. In addition to the specific activities described in the restoration and management plan, this site is a piece of a greenway system. This greenway is envisioned for a wetland complex that continues south and west for over a mile, and east for a similar distance. These wetlands are part of a large watershed along County Ditch 25, which drains a significant portion of south central Lino Lakes. It is the same complex that covers parts of the Foxborough project, which incorporated many conservation development elements to restore and conserve the wetlands. This ditch and wetland system has been identified as a high value ecological area. The Foxborough project was the first conservation development project because it was designed to accommodate and enhance this ecological system. The Integra development can be the next piece in this larger picture. Outlots C and D are unusual. They are configured out of what originally was going to be one outlot. As the restoration and management plan evolved, it became evident that restoring the entire wetland area would require far more in the way of financial resources than a project of 31 lots could provide. Therefore, the large area of wetland on the south will be broken into two outlots. The restoration and management plan includes work for Outlot C, but work in the larger Outlot D will not be part of this project. The plan foresees what should be done there, but restoration of Outlot D will not occur until additional funding can be found in the future. PLANNED UNIT DEVELOPMENT, PRELIMINARY PLAT PUD: Conservation development design considers the conservation goals more important than mathematical standards found in a zoning ordinance. A planned development provides the flexibility needed in order to implement conservation development. Section 2, Subd. 10.A. of the zoning ordinance discusses the purpose of a planned unit development (PUD). In addition, Subd. 10.D. lists the purposes of an urban PUD. The application should be compared to these purposes. Purpose and Intent. The purpose of this section of the Zoning Ordinance is to provide for the grouping of lots or buildings for development as an integrated, coordinated unit as opposed to traditional parcel by parcel, piecemeal, or sporadic approach to development. This section is intended to introduce flexibility of site design and architecture for the conservation of land and open space through clustering of lots, buildings and activities, which