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STOCKPORT DEVELOPMENT TO GO BEFORE PLANNING BOARD
Mike McCagg
ccSCOOP News
10-14-09 – 1:30 p.m. - The Stockport Town Planning Board will begin review of the proposed 112-unit housing development as early as November after the Town Board approved a new zoning designation for the project.
Proposed by SSD Stockport, the project was put on hold by the Planning Board several years ago in the midst of the environmental review process, Planning Board secretary Barbara Drabick told ccSCOOP. The project, which just last week received the new zoning designation "Planned Development District" (PDD) from the Town Board, is not on the agenda for Tuesday’s Planning Board meeting. |
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Photo by Harvey McCagg |
Brandee Nelson of Crawford & Associates, who is representing the developer, has said the firm plans to construct 76 single-family residences and 36 age-restricted townhouses in a field between Route 9 and Chester Avenue in the hamlet of Stottville. The development would built on 34 acres within a larger 122-acre tract. The remainder of the land will be open space designated forever wild. The single-family houses will be on quarter- to half-acre lots built along an extension of Sunset Avenue, which will connect Chester Avenue to Route 9.
With the PDD designation, which allows the developer to construct houses on lots smaller than the half-acre lots required by the original zoning, the project now goes back before the Planning Board for its input, Drabick said.
The Planning Board initially started its review of the project five years ago. At the time, the developer planned to construct more than a hundred single-family homes and several dozen townhouses. That proposal ran into a number of objections from town residents, and it was eventually put on hold by the developer as a result of the economic downturn. Among the concerns raised were that the development would:
- put too much stress on the water and sewer systems;
- result in an increased call volume for the emergency services;
- impact drainage, because the 122 acres of land includes a wetland and during heavy rains serves to catch run-off from Route 9 before the water reaches Chester Avenue:
- impact the viewshed, which for residents and motorists on Route 9 offers a view of the Berkshires
Besides scaling down the project, the developer took a number of steps to reduce the impact of the project before asking for the Town Board and the Planning Board to restart the review of the project earlier this year. Among the steps to reduce the impact was limiting of the development to two areas within the 34-acre proposed Planned Development District. The single-family houses would be built along a new road that would be constructed from the end of Sunset Avenue (located off Chester Avenue) to Route 9. The proposed age-restricted townhouses would be constructed in the northwest corner of the property, in the vicinity of the town’s older water tower and near the veteran’s monument on Route 9. The project was also moved back from Route 9 in an effort to limit the impact of the project on the viewshed.
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