The fourth time was the charm Wednesday night when the City
Council unanimously approved changes that will allow In-N-Out
Burger to build at Cochrane Road and U.S. 101.
The fourth time was the charm Wednesday night when the City Council unanimously approved changes that will allow In-N-Out Burger to build at Cochrane Road and U.S. 101.
Previously, council was reluctant to give the nod to the drive-through restaurant because it was not allowed by the city’s general plan. There were also problems with the architecture, landscaping and traffic flow.
On Wednesday these issues were laid to rest when council holdouts, Steve Tate and Hedy Chang and Larry Carr, questioned Ron Volle, Northern California development director for In-N-Out, to their satisfaction.
Over the course of the four sessions, a compromise was worked out that allowed the project to go forward, while giving it a better fit with Morgan Hill. Mayor Dennis Kennedy and Councilman Greg Sellers were jubilant about the agreement that, Volle claims, will bring $50,000 in annual sales taxes, 50 jobs and public-spirited support to the city.
“The council has held out for an exceptionally good quality project,” Kennedy said.
“It’s good we held out,” said Sellers.
One Morgan Hill resident, Cynthia Seibert, questioned the validity of and need for gateway designations.
“Why is Cochrane a gateway?” she asked. Seibert said she, and other people in town wanted a choice and even suggested putting the matter to a vote.
Kennedy said he had been lobbied by the populace.
“I was amazed at how many citizens stopped me on the street, both for and against.”
The “Gateway” designation controls aesthetic development at major entrances to the city, Cochrane Road being one. The original Planned Unit Development (PUD) allowed for two sit-down restaurants on the site, 6,300 and 8,000 square-feet in size. A fast food, drive-through restaurant was not considered appropriate for the gateway location.
Tharaldson Development Co., developers of the property on the northwest corner that also includes the Chevron station and two hotels, maintains they could not find two sit-down restaurants willing to invest in the site. When In-N-Out first approached the city for permission to build on the site they were turned away with a suggestion that the answer might be different if they could corral a sit-down establishment to join them.
In-N-Out returned with Applebee’s and council was somewhat mollified, even though the 8,000 square-foot restaurant had turned into a 3,253 square-foot drive-through and an Applebee’s is traditionally smaller than the designated 6,300 square-foot requirement. Volle also maintained throughout the procedure, and was backed up by some members of the Planning Commission and even the Architectural Review Board, that the site was too small to hold two large sit-downs with appropriate parking.
In-N-Out’s original landscaping plan underwhelmed the council but, on Wednesday Volle showed updated plans that included a four-foot high berm topped with shrubs to hide the drive-through aisle from motorists leaving the freeway.
The new plan added planting boxes at the foot of the building’s columns, edging closer to meeting the required 50 percent landscaping of the building’s perimeter. And Volle explained that trees had been removed from the plan for the health of the trees at the suggestion of the ARB, which includes landscaping professionals. Tate said he was initially “distressed” that the trees had been removed but understood the ARB reasoning.
A 30-foot landscaped easement between street and parking lot is required by the PUD but the freeway corner of the property leaves only 3-feet. In-N-Out is trying to secure Caltrans’ permission to landscape the currently bare freeway right-of-way to boost the corner’s appeal; Volle said he thought there would be no problem. Caltrans will allow shrubs but not trees, Volle told the council.
Traffic circulation in the development is notorious for confusion. In-N-Out plans to realign the main driveway so it travels between the two restaurants, ending up, conveniently, at the hotels at the north of the property. To do this, a waiver from Caltrans to install a driveway 10-feet closer than an existing one will be needed.
Council determined that, if Caltrans permission was not forthcoming, it could work with the driveway at its present location as long as the Public Works Director approved. Volle said he was confident that Caltrans would give permission.
Tate also worried at a previous meeting that, if the PUD were changed for In-N-Out, and if the restaurant backed out of the deal, the alterations would be available for anyone else building on the site. Council voted to put a one-year limit on the offer.
Times have changed, said Carr.
“What we are facing today is different (he mentioned the bad economy) from what we faced when the PUD was written.” Offering another point of view, he asked where drive-throughs should be located if not at freeway offramps.
“We certainly don’t want them downtown,” Carr said.
Chang, too, was willing to look on the bright side.
“While I don’t believe In-N-Out will bring in such revenues,” she said, “it does give us at least one sit-down restaurant.”
After discussing each point Tate said he had partially changed his mind about the project.
“Two sit-down restaurants are most desirable but not feasible,” he said. “I’m willing to go along with In-N-Out but I’m still not comfortable getting away from the general plan.”
Council agreed to look into the gateway policy.
Sellers said he remembered working 25 years ago for Sullivan’s Produce Stand, on the same site, thinking about the future and wondering how it would develop. He said he was happy with the results.
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