NORMAL - New student apartments will be built near Willow Street and Constitution Trail, but the complex won't have an elevated deck as an amenity.

The City Council on Monday voted against the potential "party deck," eliminated four parking spaces to allow more green space in the plan and required owner Ralph Endress to work with the town staff to come up with a plan for cleaning debris off the nearby trail.

The rest of the project, including some stacked parking - in which cars park end to end in the same space - and shorter parking spaces, was approved.

Earlier in the evening, council members agreed to tweak parking regulations for areas in the parking impact zone around the Illinois State University campus.

Previously, the town required a special use permit for stacked parking, but such a permit is no longer required in the parking impact zone.

Parking spaces also can be 17 feet deep instead of 20 feet.

"We're playing to our desire as a council to get multiple-family (housing) closer to campus," said Mayor Chris Koos.

The changes also make the developer decide if stacked parking would make apartments marketable.

Endress said he wanted to keep the original 148 parking spaces at the new development called Willow Trails so each of his tenants would have a parking space.

The development will have 144 bedrooms but five of the parking spaces will be designated for disabled parking and couldn't be used by the general population at the complex.

Endress plans to raze a rooming house at 101 E. Willow St. and an apartment building at 104 E. Locust St. to make way for two three-story buildings with three- and four-bedroom apartments. An apartment building at 98 E. Locust would be refurbished.

But Koos and council members Jeff Fritzen, Chuck Scott, Jason Chambers and Cheryl Gaines said they would rather have more green space and fewer parking spaces at the development. Council members Sonja Reece and Adam Nielsen preferred more parking.

None of the council members or town staff supported the deck that would be built over some of the parking spaces, citing concerns about safety. Endress said it was needed so the complex would have an amenity.

Chambers said he was very concerned about the development's proximity to the trail and the potential litter problems. While Endress vowed to be sure the area was cleaned each Monday, Gaines said it may need to be done more than once a day.

City Manager Mark Peterson said the new development would do a lot for the community because it would dress up the Willow Street corridor.

Chambers and Gaines ended up voting against the project even with the elimination of the elevated deck, more green space and a required cleanup plan.

Endress hopes to have the project open by fall 2009.