§ 1417-11. Institutional Buffer Yard Plan.

The development of colleges, hospitals, schools and commercial laboratories in an Institutional-Residential District must be in accordance with an approved Institutional Buffer Yard Plan.

(a)

Purpose. The Institutional Buffer Yard Plan is intended to foster the appropriate growth of colleges, hospitals, schools and commercial laboratories. The purpose of the buffer yard regulations is to require building setbacks and landscaping in a park-like setting to provide a transition from the scale of institutions to the scale of the surrounding residential neighborhood and to address conditions sometimes associated with intense institutional land uses.

(b)

When Required. Buffer yards must be provided whenever a new institution facility is constructed. New facilities include any new building, addition of more than 2,500 square feet of gross floor area to an existing building, parking garage or deck or expansion thereof, or an existing building whose use is changed to a use listed in (a) above. When the entire new facility is more than 200 feet from any district boundary line, a buffer yard is not required.

(c)

Buffer Yard Plan. On the first occasion that an institution provides a buffer yard pursuant to the requirements of this section, the institution must file a buffer yard plan with the Zoning Administrator. The plan must show all property within the IR District under control of the institution, the location of all buildings and paved areas for all parts of the institution property within 200 feet of a residential district that abuts the IR District. The plan must show the location of all buffer yards required by this section.

(d)

Buffer Yard Location. Buffer yards must be provided at all points on the perimeter of an IR District where the IR District abuts a Residential District. Buffer yards are not required, however, at any point where the new facility is obscured by an existing building when viewed by a person standing at grade on the boundary between the IR District and the residential district or where the boundary is more than 200 feet from the new facility.

(e)

Required Buffer Yard Depth. Buffer yards must be provided to a depth from the perimeter of the property a distance equal to one-sixth the height of the building or addition plus 25 feet when abutting a Residential District. An institution may designate additional depth to a required buffer yard in order to satisfy the standards over the expanded area.

(Ordained by Ord. No. 15-2004, eff. Feb. 13, 2004; a. Ord. No. 0346-2007, § 9, eff. Oct. 13, 2007; Emer. Ord. No. 141-2015, § 21, eff. July 1, 2015)