Farmington residents who live near the Park and Clark Lanes intersection voiced their concerns to the city council about proposed office buildings in the area at the Tuesday, March 2 city council meeting.

Property owner Adam Watts sought city council approval to put two office buildings adjacent to the Park Lane Utah First Credit Union.

“It is an awkward site, with the triangle and the bends of the roads. But they meet our form-based code,” said City Development Director David Petersen.

Petersen stated that, since the two-story, 12,000-square-foot structures will be in a mixed-use zone, “in order to hide the headlights, there’s gotta be like a three-foot screen.”

Watts confirmed that there would be a screen, similar to the one at McDonald’s franchises. “I think ours is better looking,” he joked. Watts also said there would be “enhanced landscaping” to help block headlights.

Though supportive of the building concept, Farmington citizens were concerned that the proposed screen wouldn’t be enough.

Holly Abel, who lives in the subdivision across from the proposed building site, wanted to know if there would be bushes on the screen. Similarly, Hillary Hallows of Clark Lane worried that even if bushes were present, they wouldn’t grow fast enough to be effective as part of the screen. She also noted that the screen only partially surrounded the site.

“I didn’t see a screen wall proposed behind the east building on the Clark Lane side, and I wanted to ensure that that was going to be on that side as well, against the residential side,” she said.

In response, Watts said that the site plan includes Karl Foerster grass in front of the three-foot wall. He also said he would be happy to add a screen wall to the east side of the site, even though he doesn’t anticipate headlights shining in that direction.

Also, said Watts, there would be trees on the south side of the site, “to add additional privacy between the site, so going above and beyond what code requires.”

After Watts addressed the residents concerns from the public hearing, Petersen added that living near an office building could be beneficial. “For the people that live in the avenues – which are not single-family homes; it’s a mixed-use townhome project – this is a home run as far as impacts to a neighborhood.”

The city council passed the subdivision schematic as recommended by the city planning commission.