Lexington restaurant plan stalls over 1 of the ‘most significant trees’ on major road
Plans to build a new restaurant on Richmond Road have been paused by Lexington city planners over the razing of several trees, including a large pin oak, on the property.
Louisville-based Hogan Real Estate wants to put a restaurant on the property at 2891 Richmond Road, which is the current site of the Sunshine Grow shop and a two-story office building that would be torn down under the proposed plan.
During a Sept 9 meeting, the Urban County Planning Commission voted unanimously to postpone the approval of a final development plan until Oct. 14. That will give the developer and city planners time to determine if the site can be reconfigured to save the trees, including the pin oak that is more than 70 feet tall. The site is zoned for a restaurant, but the developers need sign-offs on a final plan.
Developers have not disclosed the restaurant’s name but have said it is a national fast-casual dining chain. The restaurant is a “recognizable brand name” that is not fast food, and it’s not a Starbucks, said Justin Phelps of Hogan Real Estate.
The developers did not initially include a tree inventory map as required when submitting a final development plan. The developer later turned in the map, said Tom Martin, a planner with the city. The exclusion of the map was an oversight, Hogan’s lawyer said.
“It is a heavily treed site,” said Martin. The most significant is the pin oak because it’s one of the tallest. There are also other larger trees on that lot.
The developers believe the trees need to come down to make room for the restaurant with a drive-through. But Martin told the planning commission the site could be redesigned to save those trees, and staff members have several ideas for reconfiguration.
“There is no infrastructure problems on this site,” Martin said. The trees don’t need to come down for a sewer line or a road, he said.
A section of the zoning ordinance says trees larger than 36 inches in circumference and certain types of trees have to be protected. The pin oak is larger than 52 inches. The ordinance says developers can plant other types of trees if they were to raze the trees on the property.
However, the zoning ordinance also says a development’s design should “protect the greatest numbers of trees as is reasonable and practicable,” Martin said.
The developers want to put the more than 4,000-square-foot building closer to the access road along Richmond Road, where the trees are currently located. “It needs to be visible,” Hogan Real Estate lawyer Branden Gross said of the building. The restaurant also needs the drive-through.
Gross said the plans preserve other trees on the site, and the company will plant additional trees. If approved, the site will eventually have 10 percent more trees than the 20 percent tree canopy required by city ordinance.
“Pin oaks are not good trees,” Gross said. Gross said the arborist hired by the developer estimates the tree is 80 years old. Most pin oaks live for 110 years. “It’s not a special tree.”
“There isn’t a practical way for us to save the tree and make our development work,” Gross said.
Phelps said the company has tried to preserve trees at other sites, and those trees often decline because construction compromises the tree root system.
“You also got a tree that an end user is not going to be comfortable having on the site,” Phelps said.
Bruce Nichol, a member of the planning commission, said saving the tree would cost more than $800,000, which is unreasonable.
Robin Michler, a planning commission member, disagreed. The national chain came to the developer with a design that it wanted. There would be room to accommodate the tree if the developer did not want to subdivide the property into two different plots to develop the land behind the proposed restaurant, he said.
“I disagree that a tree that is old is dying. It’s not the same thing,” Michler said.
Greg Doyle of Trees Lexington said it’s impossible to tell how old the pin oak is. To do that, it has to be cored.
“It’s one of the most significant trees on Richmond Road,” Doyle said. Almost all the trees in the Richmond Road commercial corridor from New Circle Road to Man o’ War Boulevard have already been razed, he said after the Thursday meeting.
“It’s a heat island,” Doyle said of long stretches of Richmond Road that have no tree canopy cover.
There were also additional questions about access to the property from a road into the Lowe’s parking lot. Traffic engineering has questioned if the access point is too close to the service road that fronts the property. That could cause traffic backups into the Lowe’s parking lot.
This story was originally published September 14, 2021 at 10:46 AM.
