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Article 5: Development Standards
Section 5.8. Access and Circulation
5.8.6. Vehicular Access and Circulation
Morrisville, NC
June 2013
Unified Development Ordinance - Public Hearing Draft
Page 5-49
(2)
Public transit and school buses shall be provided access to designated or planned bus
stops and shelters.
(3)
Garbage trucks shall be provided access to bulk refuse containers and to points within
150 feet of individual refuse receptacle storage/collection sites.
(4)
Large delivery trucks shall be provided access to off-street loading spaces.
(5)
Small delivery trucks, service vehicles, and passenger motor vehicles shall be provided
access to points within 100 feet of a single-family detached, duplex, or manufactured
home dwelling, and to the off-street parking spaces serving any other development.
b.
The development‘s internal system of vehicular accessways shall also permit safe, convenient,
efficient, and orderly movement of vehicles between the development‘s internal origin and
destination points and the external roadway system and adjacent transit stations.
3.
Required Multiple Means of Vehicular Access
330
a.
A residential or mixed-use development shall provide each building or facility at least two
separate means of vehicular access meeting Fire Code requirements for fire apparatus
access roads if the development includes:
(1)
More than 30 single-family detached, duplex, or manufactured home dwellings, or
subdivision lots designed to contain more than 30 such dwellings; or
(2)
More than 60 single-family attached or multifamily dwelling units.
b.
A nonresidential or mixed-use development shall provide at least two separate means of
vehicular access to each building or facility that has a height exceeding 30 feet or three
stories or has a gross floor area exceeding 62,000 square feet.
c.
Where two means of vehicular access are required, the distance between the points where
such access enters the development site shall be at least ½ the maximum overall diagonal
dimension of the development site.
d.
The required two means of vehicular access shall be provided before issuance of a Building
Permit authorizing the 31st single-family detached, duplex, or manufactured home dwelling,
or the 61st single-family attached or multifamily dwelling unit.
e.
The Planning Director, after consulting with the Fire Chief, may waive these requirements on
determining provision of a second access is impractical due to topography, natural features,
cultural resources, or the configuration of adjacent developments and/or the dwellings,
buildings, or facilities are equipped with an approved automatic sprinkler system.
4.
Public Street Connectivity
331
a.
The vehicular access and circulation for a development shall incorporate the continuation and
connection of public street roadways and associated rights-of-way that have been extended
or connected to the boundary of the development site from existing or approved adjoining
developments.
332
330
This modifies requirements in Sec. 5.2.3 of the current Design and Construction Ordinance to extend them to nonresidential
buildings and to make them more consistent with the Fire Code standard on which they are based. Although having multiple means
of vehicular access is important to ensuring effective fire-fighting, it are also important to ensuring access by other emergency
services as well as safe, convenient, and efficient access for a development‘s occupants and visitors.
331
This carries forward and expands street extension provisions in Sec. 5.2.5 of the current Design and Construction Ordinance. It
simplifies the basic requirement, adds a minimum access point threshold and a minimum interval requirement (applicable to large
sites), adds a provision authorizing temporary turnarounds, adds a waiver provision for when an extension is not practical or
desirable, and adds a signage requirement intended to forestall false expectations that street to be extended is a dead-end
street. An illustration showing application of these standards is also included.
332
This requires streets stubbed to a proposed development site be extended into the proposed development.