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Planning board debates big-box rules: size threshold, buffers, design standards and special-exception role
Summary
On April 7 City of Newberry planning staff presented a proposed ordinance to regulate large-scale retail. Board members debated the 80,000-square-foot threshold, overlay buffers and design controls and gave staff direction to revise the draft (board favored a lower threshold and stronger overlay coverage). No final adoption occurred.
The Planning & Zoning Board spent the bulk of its April 7 meeting on a staff-led review of proposed land-development regulations for large-scale retail (so-called “big box”) and related updates to the city’s overlay district. The board did not adopt the ordinance but gave staff direction to revise the draft and return with firm language before the City Commission.
Staff described the draft definition of a “large single retail establishment” as a single building occupying 80,000 square feet or greater serving a regional market and listed examples such as membership wholesale clubs, discount and home-improvement retailers. The draft also ties large-scale retail to design standards in the highway overlay district and would make large-scale retail a special exception in selected commercial zones while prohibiting it in the CBD and commercial neighborhood districts.
Board members raised several substantive issues and requested specific changes:
- Size threshold and ranges: staff said 80,000 square feet was the working threshold but acknowledged developers can design around hard cutoffs. Board members discussed options, including a lower threshold of about 60,000 to capture more large-format retail or using a range (for example, 60,000–80,000) that would trigger heightened review. Several board members indicated they favored lowering the threshold to around 60,000 square feet.
- Unified development treatment: board members instructed staff to treat an integrated, single development (a unified site plan or one building with attached inline spaces) as the measured area for the threshold rather than counting individual tenants trying to split floor area to avoid review.
- Overlay boundaries and roadway buffers: staff identified a discrepancy between the overlay map and the code text describing zone buffers (15-, 25- and 50-foot buffers). The board asked staff to clarify the intended map/text relationship and recommended staff propose a clearer step-down plan for the entry corridor (board discussion included potential step-downs such as 100/50/25 feet in some locations to preserve a greenway effect when entering the city).
- Design and “human scale”: staff proposed required and optional design measures to reduce monolithic facades, including mandatory projections or “protrusions” where walls longer than 50 feet must be broken up, prominent entrances, varied rooflines, limited parapet heights, dwarf-species landscaping adjacent to long walls, and provisions to limit the amount of parking placed between the building and the right-of-way. The board also discussed massing rules (staff proposed at least 15% volumetric modulation) and pedestrian connections for larger tenants.
- Parking and site orientation: staff urged limiting frontal parking to no more than one drive aisle and two parking aisles in the overlay to encourage buildings closer to the road, while permitting larger parking areas behind the building. The board asked that if any portion of a unified development falls inside the overlay, the whole unified development should adhere to overlay standards (staff agreed to draft that language).
- Special exception role: staff and board members discussed the value and legal limits of the special-exception process. Staff noted a denial after an applicant meets the code can be legally vulnerable unless the record supplies competent, substantial evidence. The board said the special exception remains a tool to negotiate compatibility (setbacks, buffers, site orientation) on a case-by-case basis, but asked staff to tighten standards so there is a clear record for future decisions.
- Height: several board members expressed a desire to limit height in overlay areas to maintain small-town character; a suggestion of roughly 42 feet (about three stories) was discussed as a possible cap for areas where the overlay sets the town edge.
Board members asked staff to revise the ordinance to reflect the guidance — including a lower size threshold (staff was directed to consider 60,000 square feet), clearer overlay geometry and buffers tied to roadway context, unified-development language, and explicit parking/landscape provisions — and return the revised draft to the board and then the City Commission. The board did not place a final recommendation to the commission on the ordinance at this meeting; staff said they would bring a revised draft forward for formal action.
