The City Plan Commission met 05/10/2023. They spent the bulk of the meeting on the public hearing, discussion, and vote regarding a special use permit for a car wash located at 4029 E Calumet Street which is on the east side of town near the corner of Calumet Street and Eisenhower Drive.
This lot had formerly been a used car sales business. The new owner wanted to install a drive-through car wash with vacuum stations. The existing building on the lot would remain and would most likely house a car detailing operation. Back in 2020, the owner had applied for and been granted a special use permit for a car wash on that site but then did not move forward with the project at that time. The special use permit had expired, so he was now applying for a new one so that he could move forward. The plans had not substantively changed from 2020 to 2023. The commission approved the special use permit.
I’ve prepared a transcript of the discussion for download.
One member of the public voiced his concerns about the proposed car wash. He said that he was speaking on behalf of the owners of TJ Thai Sushi & Japanese Steakhouse that is located right there and also noted that he had been a former resident of Victorian Village so was familiar with the area. He raised a number of issues:
- Vehicle access to the property. (Access to the business was from Lorna Lane, not Calumet Street or Eisenhower Drive and it sounded like there were possibly issues with the public using the TJ Steakhouse parking lot to access other businesses.)
- Traffic problems generally seeming to be related to traffic on Eisenhower getting backed up to Coop Road.
- Safety issues related to a nearby daycare and senior living center.
- The large number of carwashes that exist on the east side of town. (The speaker said there were 14 within a 2 ½ mile radius and 30 overall on the east side of Appleton.)
The speaker finished up by suggesting that somebody conduct a traffic study because the area had a lot of traffic issues.
Brannin Gries of Gries Architecture spoke on behalf of the property owner. He said that the development of the site would deal with access to the site, landscaping, vehicle circulation, and stormwater. He noted that there were some stormwater issues in the area currently that his team was working with the city to address. He thought the redevelopment of that lot would clean up that corner area by the intersection quite a lot.
When it came time for the commission to discuss the item, Mayor Woodford spoke specifically about the concern that there were too many car washes in the area. [These concerns have come up a couple times over the last year or so, starting with Club Car Wash building on the former Applebee’s lot.]
Mayor Woodford said, “it’s not the role of the planning commission to make determinations about the types of private uses on private property in the city in terms of what kind of business is located in a general vicinity. A similar example would be in a case where there are multiple fast-food restaurants in close proximity. We don’t evaluate whether one fast food restaurant—there’s already a McDonald’s here, why would a Tom’s go here? That’s not the role of the Plan Commission to make those determinations, and that’s not a that’s not a subject of our evaluation or staff’s evaluation. So, I just wanted to be clear about that, that the city doesn’t make doesn’t dictate the types of businesses that locate in particular locations, so long as the use is conforming with the applicable codes.”
Principal Planner Jessica Titel addressed some of the traffic concerns regarding the area and said that the city would be doing some striping at the intersection of Calumet Street and Coop Road which she thought would help with some of the problems. However, there was no traffic study planned for the area.
She also noted that this development specifically would need to still undergo a plan review to make sure that everything complied with Appleton’s zoning code standards.
The commission voted unanimously to approve the special use permit.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1101169&GUID=2B698670-A214-4AFB-8F2F-FAA527F1B4E4
Another Car Wash…Com’n…Shake your heads. I am wondering if these businesses recycle their grey water ? No study on traffic flow, impact on surrounding businesses. I think the commission should have had more facts on hand.