HomeMy WebLinkAboutLetter #15 Robert Auster, Tallyn's Ridge HOA TALLYN’S RIDGE HOA
14421 Tallyn Way
Carmel, IN 46074
CITY OF CARMEL, INDIANA
Joe Shestak, Secretary, City of Carmel Plan Commission
Carmel City Hall
One Civic Square
Carmel, IN 46032
Our homeowners association has met with the developer (Steve Pittman) of the proposed PZ-2020-
00155 PUD, the proposed rezoning at the southeast intersection of 146th Street and Shelborne Road and
identified by the Hamilton County Auditor’s Offices as Tax Parcel Number 17-09-20-00-00-001.000. The
purpose of our meeting with Mr. Pittman was to try to come to some middle ground regarding the
proposed PUD and the impact on our community. Nearly all residents in the Tallyn’s Ridge Community
are completely opposed to the addition of multi-family housing that will cause traffic and safety
problems, create even more problems with school capacity issues, destroy local wildlife habitat, and
potentially lower the property values of the existing community.
Prior to Meeting with Mr. Pittman our HOA discussed all of the following items in consideration of the
proposed PUD:
How good is the site plan
Architectural Standards
Open Space
Buffering / Transition
Setbacks
Landscaping
Tree Preservation
Lot Size and housing Density consistent with adjoining developments
As a homeowners group we all are in understanding that the subject property will be developed and the
present S-1 zoning does not address some of the more resolute points that the proposed PUD does. We
met with Mr. Pittman to discuss reasonable modifications to the proposed PUD which were
representative of a majority if not all of the residents of our community. These items consisted of the
following:
Lot size of the single family homes within the proposed PUD, with the understanding the dual
family homes being proposed and where they are being proposed may very well be an
inevitable reality
Discrepancy between the PUD request for 86 homes and the proposed development illustration
which shows 79 homes
Retention of existing mature trees
Entrance and exit from the new development on and off of old 146th street
We approached Mr. Pittman with the above items, the largest single item being the lot size of the single
family homes and more importantly the lot size of the single family lots directly abutting our
development’s homeowners. We discussed these items with the understanding that other points in the
PUD request had already addressed buffer areas and architectural standards which we believed were
likely to meet the requirements of the commission and were not a topic of our discussion.
We shared a concern from our development residents that without access on an off of old 146th street
that this will create a significant amount of additional traffic into our development and does present a
risk factor of traffic surge during morning rush hours that will negatively impact safety for children, since
students walk to and board the school buses in the mornings. In general, the area would be directly
connected to the Tallyn’s Ridge development by the extension of Trahan Drive and likely become the
preferred traffic pattern of those residents’ of this new development in order to avoid the intersection
of 146th Street and Shelborne
Both for esthetic and ecological value we had asked for the preservation of any existing mature trees
Lastly the biggest item is the lot size of the single family homes and most importantly an emphasis was
made to address the lot size of those lots that directly back to the existing homes in our development.
We shared with Mr. Pittman that if at a minimum his group could come back with some modification of
those lots that directly affected our residents that our HOA and homeowners in general would likely be
able to provide support for the proposed PUD.
Unfortunately on Monday morning (11/16/2020) Mr. Pittman reported that his group was still moving
forward with their request as originally submitted with the only modification being the PUD request was
to be amended from 86 homes to 82 homes as the drawing illustrating 79 homes had not gone through
final engineering as of yet. This meant no access on and off of the new development to old 146th street,
no guarantee of mature tree retention and most importantly to our homeowner group densely
clustered homes with minimum distant between them (10 ft.) directly out their back door.
Aside from the traffic concerns noted above there are other items that affect our community as follows
Schools capacity should also be considered by the planning commission as approval of multi-family
dwellings that will create or exacerbate a situation that could cause school concurrency to fail if this
proposal and/or other similar plans to increase the home/resident density were to be approved.
Wildlife has been observed in the area, and any development will destroy their habitat.
Any planned development of the property should consider the continuing impact to local wildlife
habitat. I would suggest this be investigated by the appropriate agency prior to approving any plans for
the development.
Property values are likely to go down in the area if multi-family housing units are built. Multi-family
dwellings and smaller lot size homes are inconsistent with the neighborhoods directly connected with
this project. However, most importantly is for those residents that back up to the home sites in the new
development they will be looking at a wall of homes due to the significant inconsistency of the lot size
and minimum distant between homes that is a deviation from the current zoning of this property and
not what they anticipated and relied on when they purchased their home sometime in the last two
years
As a homeowners group we urge you to disapprove the proposed rezoning. We are not opposed to
compromise as shared above, yet we don’t feel as if the development group is making any compromise
that would allow this community to blend well with its neighbors.
Thank you for your continued service and support of our communities.
Best regards,
Robert J. Auster
President
Tallyn’s Ridge HOA