Site Design Alt #3 + General Site Design Vignette Questions

[gibiwan]

After doing this alternate, a couple of questions came up for me. What is the consensus regarding overlapping new trees with one another as well as overlapping new trees with new built elements (walkways and plaza)? For the shading requirement, if the Restaurant is only 36'-0" tall and my plaza is deeper, I am assuming that I am not meeting the shading requirement because anything past 36'-0" will be in sun, correct? How have people solved for that?

So here is the program for Alt #3, I would love some feedback. It is using the same site plan as the NCARB practice vignette.
A developer plans to build an Office Tower, a Restaurant, and a Pedestrian Plaza on the site, with parking to serve the new buildings.

1. Locate the 4-story, 48 ft high Office Building close to Bentley Avenue.
· The main entrance shall be protected from winter winds by buildings and/or trees, as appropriate.

2. Locate the 2-story, 36 ft high Restaurant close to the pond.

3. Draw a 12,000 ft² Pedestrian Plaza.
· Locate the Pedestrian Plaza within the building limit lines so that the main entrance to Restaurant opens directly onto the Pedestrian Plaza.

4. The view of the service entrance on the Restaurant shall be blocked from the Pedestrian Plaza.
· The view of the Service Entrance shall be blocked by buildings and/or trees, as appropriate.

5. The Office shall have a view of the Pond.

6. The main entrance of the Restaurant must be visible from Academy Street.

7. The Pedestrian Plaza shall be shaded from noon sun
· Assume 45 degree solar angle.

8. Draw a total of 42 parking spaces.
· 38 standard (9 ft x 18 ft) parking spaces are required.
· 4 universally accessible (12 ft x 18 ft) parking spaces are required.
· Locate the universally accessible parking spaces within 100 ft of the main entrance of the Restaurant.
· All parking spaces shall be perpendicular to the traffic aisles.
· No parallel parking is permitted.

9. Draw all traffic aisles and drives required to connect parking to the street.
· Drive-through circulation is required.
· Dead-end parking is prohibited.
· All drives and traffic aisles are automatically drawn at a width of 24 ft.
· The intersection of the access drive with the street must be perpendicular to the street[size=]for at least the first 20 ft of the drive.

10. Provide only one curb cut along Academy Street, located no closer than 120 ft from the intersection of the centerlines of the two existing public streets.

11. Draw vehicular circulation to access the parking and service entrance.
· A service drive shall attach to the service entrance of the Restaurant.
· A turnaround or drive-through circulation is not required for the service drive.

12. Connect the Pedestrian Plaza, the universally accessible parking spaces, and the main entrances of the two buildings to each other and to the existing public walk with a continuous walkway system.
· The Pedestrian Plaza shall be considered part of the walkway system.
13. Adhere to the following general conditions:
· Paving on the site shall be minimized.
· Drives, traffic aisles, and parking spaces shall be no closer than 7 ft to a building.
· Buildings must be separated by a minimum of 30 ft.
· Provide a 30 ft setback from the Pond for all construction or built improvements.
· No more than 8 existing trees may be removed or disturbed.
· No construction or built improvements of any kind shall occur over any other existing site feature.
· No construction or built improvements of any kind shall occur outside the building limit line except for direct vehicular and pedestrian access.
· Buildings shall not overlap the Pedestrian Plaza or parking.

[toddsmith56]

Everything looks good, the only caveat is the prevailing winds from the north. There may not be enough coniferous trees to block them from the pedestrian plaza in the winter. (deciduous trees will not protect it from the winds during the winter because the leaves will have fallen)

Not sure how picky NCARB is about this, better safe than sorry, I would assume.

Hope this helps!