Richardson City Plan Commission Meeting April 1st, 2025
All current commissioners and alternates are present. One regular commissioner vacancy exists for now. Two new commissioners have been appointed. Joe Quirk and Jeremy Thomason are present for their first CPC meeting as regular commissioners. With eight commissioners present, Chair Marsh designates Commissioner Purdy to vote on the first public hearing item. Chair Marsh will recuse himself from the second public hearing item so both alternates will vote on that item.
PUBLIC HEARING – RICHARDSON TOWNHOMES
There is no item approving minutes of previous meetings tonight, so we move right along to the first of the two public hearings scheduled tonight. The first is on ZF 25-06. This is a rezoning request for an 89-unit townhome development at 3600 Shiloh Rd. This borders the City of Plano and is currently zoned for office use. The Future Land Use Plan designates this area mostly as Neighborhood Service with a small portion being designated Innovation/Industry. Single-Family Attached is deemed an appropriate secondary use here. This area is also adjacent to a Neighborhood Residential area. Since this will front onto Shiloh Rd., the City of Plano is asking the applicant to make roadway modifications.
Staff presents a background of the request. These 89 townhomes will be a maximum of 45 ft. with three stories across 20 buildings. The minimum sq. ft. will be 1,700 sq. ft. An 8 ft. sidewalk will be constructed along the western property line with ornamental trees. This community will not be gated and will have a mandatory HOA. A dog park will be located in the development as well as a 5,000 sq. ft. open space area. Staff notes that three public comments have been received opposing the request.
Chair Marsh asks questions about layout and setbacks. Commissioner Thomason asks if there are any drainage concerns on this site. Staff answers that they are not concerned about drainage issues. The developer is properly planning to meet drainage needs. The applicant steps forward to present their request and answer questions.
Commissioner Thomason asks when the HOA would be turned over to residents. The applicant answers that they will bring one resident onto the HOA board at 75% occupancy. At 90% buildout, a second resident will be brought onto the board. At full buildout, the HOA will be turned over to residents. They will be built in phases. Commissioner Purdy asks how they determined the sale price for these units. The applicant answers that they used nearby similar townhome developments as a comparison. These averaged $500K - $550K. Chair Marsh asks how far away visitor parking is from the central units. The applicant answers that it’s probably roughly a 2-minute walk at a distance of roughly 650 ft.
One speaker is present for this hearing, Scott Bratcher. He is the HOA president of a neighboring community. He wants to ensure that the screening wall is maintained. He also expresses that parking seems light. He is mostly in support of the request with a few tweaks. The applicant returns to conclude their presentation. The applicant states that they will look at adding more parking.
Chair Marsh supports the request and encourages the applicant to improve the parking layout. Commissioner Roberts compliments the applicant’s willingness to address concerns expressed by neighbors. Commissioner Purdy struggles to understand how $500K townhomes will help with missing middle housing. Commissioner Thomason sees undeveloped land being developed as housing as a positive for the city. He is in support of the request. Commissioner Quirk is also in support of the request. The CPC unanimously recommends approval of the request.
PUBLIC HEARING – ZIPLINE DRONE OPERATIONS/MAINTENANCE CENTER
The second public hearing of the evening is on ZF 25-07. Chair Marsh recuses himself due to a conflict of interest. Since Council has not currently appointed a vice-chair for this commission, the commission will need to nominate and vote on a designee to serve as vice-chair on this item. Commissioner Beach nominates Commissioner Roberts. The CPC unanimously votes in favor and Commissioner Roberts takes control of the meeting.
ZF 25-07 is a special permit request by Zipline for a newly established Drone Operations and Maintenance Center use at 1155 Kas Dr. This is located within the Employment Sub-District of the Collins/Arapaho TOD & Innovation District. This area is designated as Innovation/Industry by the Future Land Use Plan. Zipline intends to use this site as a regional headquarters hub to perform maintenance, business operations, and customer support activities. A docking station will be located in the rear of the property for testing drones. Drones are not anticipated to be flying in and out of this site as of now. But this would be allowed if approved and could of course change in the future.
Staff presents a background of the request. Staff reviews the regulatory framework related to drones. The FAA regulates flight and noise. The state regulates security. Local government can regulate ground-based operations such as when they can take off and land. Staff clarifies that the docking station will be screened by the building. Staff also clarifies that this will not serve as a delivery hub. Zipline will use Zip drones, which have an 8 ft. wingspan. These can fly at 70 mph and can carry a maximum 8-pound payload. These emit noise that is recorded at between 53 – 64 decibels. No public comments have been received regarding this request.
Commissioner Roberts asks what the hours of operations will be and if drones will be flying in. Staff answers that their understanding is that the applicant seeks to operate “during normal business hours” but the applicant can speak to that better than staff can. The applicant now steps forward to present their request. She presents a map that shows 10 delivery hubs around the metroplex. This Richardson location would not be a delivery hub but would serve as a regional operations and maintenance center for their DFW metroplex operations. The applicant recaps the way their drones operate. At the point of delivery, the main drone will hover at roughly 300 ft. and lower a smaller droid with a stability propeller on a tether to the ground to make the delivery.
The applicant presents a slide that states that the Zip drone (I believe that is the larger 8 ft. wingspan drone) emits 53 dBA without a payload and 64 dBA with a payload. Again, the dBA is a weighted measurement that attempts to gauge which Hz frequencies may feel louder to people. I wish these drone operators would simply present the raw dB level and Hz frequency of the sound emitted so we can make our own determinations as to how loud these will be. She also doesn’t specify how long the delivery takes with this tether method. These flights operate autonomously but are monitored by operators. The applicant clarifies that, for now, drones will be brought in by trucks for maintenance and testing. This is because no delivery partner hubs are located close enough to this site to allow them to fly in. It sounds like if this changes, drones could then be flying in.
Commissioner Thomason asks if they have issues with anyone shooting down their drones. The applicant answers that this is not something they have to deal with. These drones move at 70 mph 300 ft. in the air, so that would be nearly impossible to shoot. Also, these are considered aircraft, so shooting one down is a federal crime.
Commissioner Quirk asks if they would ever fly these drones in for maintenance. The applicant answers that they don’t expect to for the foreseeable future. Commissioner Roberts asks if anything prevents them from ever flying drones in and out of this facility. Staff later clarifies that nothing prevents them from flying drones so that should be considered part of this request. Commissioner Roberts asks if any safety incidents have occurred in any of their operations. The applicant answers that none have occurred.
Commissioner Purdy asks how many people will be employed at this site. The applicant answers that currently a couple dozen employees exist and they hope to create more jobs for local citizens. Commissioner Quirk asks how the drones communicate. The applicant answers that it is redundant with cellular, GPS, and other communications. They can still come back and dock if they experience a loss of power.
Commissioner Roberts generally supports the request. Commissioner Purdy also supports the request but cautions that some members of the community may be concerned about drones.
Two speakers are present for this hearing. The first is Ken Herman. He is a drone operator for construction videography. He supports the request. The second speaker is Adrian Doko. He is the leader of a nonprofit that promotes drones. He supports the request.
The CPC unanimously recommends approval of the request, and the meeting adjourns. Both of these zoning requests are tentatively scheduled for an April 28th Council hearing.