An old site plan for the Crew Carwash project at Smith Valley and Morgantown Road. The updated plan wasn’t available at press time. Site plan provided
Plans for a Crew Carwash at Morgantown and Smith Valley roads were denied last night by a county board.
Crew Carwash was denied a special exception from the Johnson County Board of Zoning Appeals on Tuesday to allow a car wash in a neighborhood business zoning district, or B-1. The facility would’ve been on approximately three acres at the northeast corner of South Morgantown Road and West Smith Valley Road.
The board denied the request based on traffic at a nearby intersection and the project being higher in intensity than the surrounding area.
Around the project site is the Sheffield Park neighborhood a future commercial development. The development is slated to be a grocery store and a strip mall containing at least four tenants, said Michele Hansard, county director of planning and zoning.
The county zoning ordinance requires petitioners to receive special exception approval by the board of zoning appeals for certain uses that dictate special consideration, Hansard said.
Although the board rejected the special exception, Hansard said the planning staff recommended approval because the petitioner had satisfied the findings of fact.
The specifics
Crew Carwash was planning an automatic car wash facility with self-service cleaning bays that would operate from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day, according to the staff report.
Eric Prime, a local attorney representing Crew Carwash, said the company had taken to accommodate the county and neighbors. This includes dedicating a portion of the parcel to a roundabout the county is planning at Smith Valley Road and Morgantown Road, and reserving one 0.96 acres of the land for greenspace.
He also said the company would plant trees and shrubs flanking a 5-foot berm and 6-foot fence to shield activity from people living to the east, while leaving as many of the existing mature trees there as possible.
Prime also passed out information on lighting at the site to the board and neighbors. The lighting plan indicates light would go straight down and would be designed so it would not bleed offsite, he said.
He said the car wash is situated relatively far away from the nearest homes. The closest back property line is 289 feet from the exit to the wash bay, which is almost the length of a football field.
Public feedback
Approximately seven people spoke during public comment, all against the proposed development.
Lynn Ripberger, president of the Sheffield Park Homeowners Association, or HOA, said it is “somewhat troublesome to all of us” to have a large corporation “jeopardize” their homes, which she said is the largest investment a person makes in their lifetime.
She asked the board to imagine having a family reunion or their child’s graduation party and hearing the noise of a car wash, which she played on her phone for the board and attendees to hear. She said she currently hears her neighbors at her property, despite trees and objects placed in between them.
Ripberger also had concerns about water pressure, the environment and health, traffic, trash at the vacuums and lighting at the facility.
“The light and noise bleed in the neighborhood as well as the trash and other nuisances are going to be a problem,” she said. “I ask you to consider if your home were to directly back up to this carwash, how would you feel? If that makes you go, ‘hmm,’ then perhaps we need to stand in solidarity with our homeowners and vote no … “
Shelly Carnes, vice president of the HOA, had concerns about property values, traffic, noise pollution and not being able to sleep because of continuous noise since she and her husband work nights in the nursing field. Like Ripberger, she said noise already carries from the west.
She also referenced another nearby Crew Carwash at 135 and Fairview Road that is 3.1 miles, or seven minutes, away. She didn’t understand why the neighborhood needed a carwash when they had one that close and why Crew Carwash couldn’t find another location for the project that could better support its volume and type of business.
“So basically they have more than enough money to put their carwash anywhere besides next to a subdivision,” Carnes said. “We can’t move our homes (that) we poured all this time and care and money into over the years. This is our home.”
Carnes also said the White River Comprehensive Plan states that any new non-residential development along the Smith Valley corridor should be of lower intensity, and she said she doesn’t believe the car wash is a low-intensity project.
In rebuttal, Prime said the berm, fence, trees and distance from homes would handle the noise complaints from residents. However, after public comment, Prime said the company would commit to adding a 23-foot wall 15 feet beyond the exit, which would be as tall as the main part of the building.
In response to environmental concerns, Prime said Crew Carwash recycles 40% of the water used in the facility and there would be no runoff of chemicals into the neighborhood.
The company chose to put a carwash at the location because it focuses on being hyperlocal and would serve the neighborhood. The company knows if it puts a carwash here, it won’t kill the one on 135 and Fairview Road, Prime said. He also said it is speculative as to whether the business would hurt property values knowing this is going to be a business of some sort.
“We are trying to be good neighbors here,” he said. “We want to leave them an acre of green space that nobody else will guarantee. Any other user is going to use as much of that space as they can … this is a good use in terms of the weird shape of this lot, and we’re taking care to make it the least impactful as possible on the folks nearby.”
The decision
Board member Steve Powell had concerns with the project, including traffic backup at an intersection near the proposed development and the project not being low intensity.
“My concern is that once again it’s that it’s not low-intensity use. It’s a violation, in my opinion, of what the zoning is there,” he said while developing the findings of fact with the board. “… It’s a bad use of the property … It doesn’t fit and it adds to traffic problems and it’s between two major middle schools of Center Grove … not to mention the fire department down there and everything else.”
Charley Canary, a board member, said some of the permitted uses would still cause issues with the site just because of design, not because of an abuse of zoning.
All members of the board voted to deny the special exception. The finding of facts discovery was continued to the board’s next meeting on Aug. 27, although the decision was finalized.
