Commerce City board approves 35-foot sign at 5200 Oneida to improve wayfinding

The Commerce City Board of Adjustment on Jan. 13 unanimously approved a variance to raise the maximum freestanding sign height at 5200 Oneida Street from 10 feet to 35 feet.

Planner Nathan Chavez told the board the 3.81-acre site sits about "8 feet 6 inches below the I‑270 grade" and is more than "102 feet from I‑270" in the applicant’s materials, making a 10-foot sign effectively unreadable for interstate motorists. "Strict enforcement of the standards would allow for a free standing sign that's only 1 foot 6 inches above the I‑270 grade, which will not be legible to motorists on I‑270," Chavez said.

Property owner Owen Orr described the project as a 58,412-square-foot industrial flex building and said the sign is intended purely for identification. "We've owned this property since 2011," Orr said. "The height variance is simply to allow for that visibility to the passerby and promote project identification." Consultant Sheldon Marshall of Yesco showed design details and visibility studies, noting the proposed 35-foot pylon would sit lower than a nearby TA truck-stop sign and that a 30-foot option would be less visible heading eastbound toward I‑70. Marshall described the address panel as a roughly 4-foot-wide panel with "2-foot tall" numbers and said the structural element below that is "22 feet 6 inches in height."

Chavez said staff found the application met the approval criteria in section 21-3-222.3 of the land development code and reported staff had received "no written comments" from the public. Board member Frey Waite moved to approve the variance, saying he agreed with staff that the site's topography created a hardship; Mayor Douglas seconded the motion. The board voted 4–0 to approve AV25-0006.

The board closed the public hearing after no members of the public signed up to speak. The applicant and staff said they would follow up during the sign-permit process on illumination and final design details.