Council adopts rezoning to allow warehouse/distribution center at Villa Creek with hours, screening conditions

Farmers Branch city council on Tuesday approved an amendment to Planned Development District 74 to allow construction of a single-story, roughly 126,000-square-foot warehouse and office building at 2665–2775 Villa Creek Drive, subject to conditions addressing screening, traffic routing, light and noise mitigation and restricted hours of operation.

Brett Mangum, lead planner, presented the concept plan and explained requested modifications to PD 74: reduced setbacks (request to reduce a residential-proximity slope requirement from roughly 140 feet to as close as 95 feet on some building “bump-outs”); permission for bay doors and loading docks to face property zoned single-family (the Dallas Christian College campus, which is zoned single-family but used for institutional purposes); allowance for a wood privacy fence in lieu of required masonry; and limited parking between the building face and the street.

The applicant described a 126,000-square-foot building with about 138 off-street parking spaces, a landscape plan showing about 16% green space, and a proposal for truck routing that would encourage trucks to use Villa Creek and Ford Road to access I-635 rather than turning through the more constrained Villa Creek/Josie Lane intersection. Applicants and staff confirmed they had mailed notices to property owners within 300 feet and that Dallas Christian College submitted a letter of support.

Planning and zoning recommended approval 6–1 with four conditions: (1) additional screening for light and noise abatement, (2) additional traffic ingress/egress information, (3) applicant outreach to neighboring residents, and (4) defined hours of operation. Council incorporated those recommendations and approved the ordinance amendment with an explicit hours-of-operation restriction of 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. Council also discussed signage and physical roadway changes to discourage truck turns through residential streets; staff said they would pursue additional truck restriction signage and coordinate potential reconfiguration of access lanes near the historic park to prevent large vehicles from making the route.

Several residents and the college had expressed concern about truck routing, lighting, and proximity to residential uses; the applicant supplied a photometric study and offered additional landscaping (including a two-foot berm and additional tree plantings at a key corner) and a proposed eight-foot wooden perimeter fence. Council members asked for clarity on truck counts and the applicant’s traffic consultants said they expected truck movements to be roughly 10%–15% of overall site traffic, primarily smaller box or sprinter trucks with occasional tractor-trailers.

The ordinance (No. 3937) was approved with the added hours restriction and the applicant will proceed to a detailed site plan review. The approvals require the detailed site plan to substantially match the concept materials now approved or return for further public review if there are substantive changes.