P&Z Hopes To Stem Landscape

Recontouring With Sand And Gravel Regs

By Andrew Gorosko

The Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z) has tightened its sand and gravel regulations, placing stricter limits on how much earthen fill can be removed from or deposited on a building lot in connection with road construction.

Through the revised regulations, the P&Z seeks to restrict the extensive recontouring of the landscape for development such as residential subdivision construction.

In the regulations unanimously approved April 6, the P&Z more strictly defines the “200 cubic yard limit” on the removal and deposition of fill on building lots.

In March 1997, P&Z members had revised their regulations, limiting how much earth material can be removed from or deposited on house lots when subdivisions are built. Those rule changes stemmed from the extensive amount of earth material which was removed by developers of the Whispering Pines subdivision on Miya Lane in Sandy Hook, radically recontouring the landscape there.

But the P&Z’s lawyer later determined the rule changes approved by the P&Z in March 1997 to be ambiguous.

The problems with that regulation became apparent after developer Angelo Memoli sued the P&Z over its 1998 P&Z rejection of his 8-lot Abbey Ridge Estates residential subdivision off South Main Street in Botsford. P&Z members had turned down Abbey Ridge Estates, stating that it required too radical a recontouring of the landscape to build a steep road on the rugged terrain.

A judge later ruled that the P&Z’s 200-cubic-yard fill limit was ambiguous, in effect approving the Abbey Ridge Estates subdivision. After his court victory, Mr Memoli sold the development rights to the 20-acre property lying east of South Main Street, just south of Botsford Hill Road. The property has not yet been developed.

Revised Regulation

P&Z Chairman Daniel Fogliano said April 6 the revised sand and gravel regulation would limit overall cutting and filling on a development site to restrict extensive recontouring of the landscape.

P&Z member Lilla Dean expressed doubts, though, over whether the revised rule would stop radical recontouring of the land. The original 200-cubic-yard rule passed by the P&Z in 1997 was not able to stop it, she noted.

In the revised regulation, the P&Z specifies that the 200-cubic-yard limit on the removal or addition of fill on a building lot includes the material associated with or necessary for regrading an existing or proposed road, when such regrading is not within the existing or proposed public road right of way.

The revised regulation could result in better-designed subdivisions, Mr Fogliano said. He said he does not expect that the new restrictions would result in developers using guardrails and retaining walls to get around the rule.

 Memorandum

 In a memorandum submitted to the P&Z on the recontouring issue before the April 6 session, Elizabeth Stocker, the P&Z’s planner, wrote that the 200-cubic-yard limit approved by the P&Z in March 1997 has not had the desired effect.

“The [existing] regulation has not substantially reduced the development potential of land and the regulations have not reduced [construction] density,” she wrote.

In a March 22 letter to the P&Z, Town Engineer Ronald Bolmer wrote of the then-proposed revised regulation, “Developers will develop creative ways to work around it… The town will see an increase in retaining walls and guide rail systems in order to develop land… From an engineering point of view, it is desirable not to have these systems, as they become maintenance problems as well as safety hazards… I would rather see more fill added or removed from a lot in order to eliminate the need for them.”

Mr Bolmer suggested the P&Z allow some flexibility in its regulations concerning earthen fill for development.

In her memo to the P&Z, Ms Stocker wrote there is no provision in the town road ordinance which would prevent a developer from increasing the width of a public road’s right way to circumvent the revised sand-and-gravel regulation.

Ms Stocker expressed concern about placing stricter limits on grading because the town does not now have a set of standards on retaining wall construction. The long-term maintenance of such structures will be a town responsibility, she noted.

The P&Z has the ability to better manage the need for retaining walls and guard rails by creating zoning regulations, she wrote.

“We will continue to see creative solutions [by developers to get] around the regulatory impediments,” she wrote.