Brookfield trustees on Oct. 11 moved to close a loophole in the Station Area Zoning Code seen as a way for multifamily building developers to avoid including enough onsite vehicle parking by using bicycle parking in place of vehicle spaces.
In a unanimous vote, trustees amended the code to provide a formula that will preserve a parking space-to-dwelling unit ratio of at least 1-to-1, which had been a concern of multiple trustees during deliberations on a proposed 14-unit apartment building at 8845 Burlington Ave., which was approved in July.
The Station Area Zoning Code as previously written simply allowed developers to obtain one vehicle parking spot credit by substituting it for six covered, long-term bicycle parking spots. There was no limit in the code on how many vehicles spots could be eliminated using that credit formula.
Without any bike parking credits, the developer of 8845 Burlington Ave. would have to had to provide 17.5 onsite vehicle parking spaces, since the code calls for developers to provide 1.25 parking spaces per dwelling unit.
In the case of the Burlington Avenue proposal, the developer initially planned for just 11 onsite parking spaces, asking credit for 6.5 vehicle parking spaces by proposing to provide long-term parking for 39 bicycles.
Village trustees concerned with potential abuse of the multifamily building parking space credit provision called on the Brookfield Planning and Zoning Commission to craft language amending the Station Area Zoning Code relative to bike parking credits to avoid a repeat request.
The amended code now limits the bike parking credit to 15 percent of the total number of required vehicle parking spaces based on the number of dwelling units. In the case of 8845 Burlington Ave., which would have required 17.5 spaces for 14 dwelling units, the most parking spaces the developer could now get credit for would be 2.6, which the village would round up to three.
After getting pushback from village officials prior to the July approval, the developer of 8845 Burlington Ave. ended up providing 13 onsite parking spaces. Had the new law been place at that time, the developer would have had to provide 14.
“A table has been added to the ordinance to make sure that it’s very clear how this is being calculated going forward,” said Village President Michael Garvey prior to the vote.
