Porterville planners review Chipotle-anchored 4,500 sq. ft. commercial building at Riverwalk Marketplace

Porterville’s Project Review Committee on Monday reviewed plans for a proposed 4,500-square-foot commercial building at Riverwalk Marketplace that would include a Chipotle with a drive-through lane.

City planning staff said the site is inside a planned development zone district with a master sign program for the shopping center and that the proposal otherwise complies with the retail-center zone rules. Oscar Cepeda, chair of the Project Review Committee and an associate planner in the planning division, led the presentation and called for follow-up on signage and development-standard compliance.

Planning staff noted the code requires a minimum six-car queuing space for drive-throughs measured from the menu board; the applicant’s drawing shows eight spaces. Robert Hutchinson, the project architect, said Chipotle’s internal data typically show a maximum four-car stack for its pickup-style drive-through, and he…