Turkey Ridge, an 11-lot residential subdivision proposed for a 28.5-acre site at 96 Toddy Hill Road, has gained a wetlands/watercourses protection permit from the town.

Steve Maguire, senior town land use enforcement officer, on May 30 approved the permit after reviewing development plans for the project, which is proposed under the terms of the Planning and Zoning Commission's "open space conservation subdivision" (OSCS) regulations.

The P&Z was scheduled to conduct a public hearing on Turkey Ridge on the night of Thursday, June 1. The wetlands/watercourses protection plans for Turkey Ridge were not subject to an Inland Wetlands Commission (IWC) public hearing, but were reviewed by town land use agency staff members.

The wetlands application for the project notes that the site is located in the town's Aquifer Protection District (APD), but is not located in any public water supply watershed.

The wetlands/watercourses protection permit is subject to nine conditions of approval. Among those conditions: the term of the permit is five years; soil erosion and sedimentation controls shall be installed and maintained on the site as deemed necessary by the town; any changes to the site plans are subject to town approval; and the limits of physical disturbance at the site must be marked, inspected, and approved before any construction work starts, among various other requirements.

The wooded, sloping development site lies west of Toddy Hill Road, north of Turkey Roost Road, south of Clearview Drive, and east and north of Kaechele Drive. The property is in a R-2 (Residential) zone, where typically a building lot would need to be at least two acres to meet the zoning regulations for such subdivision development.

However, because the applicant submitted the proposal under the terms of the OSCS regulations, the building lots at the parcel would be considerably smaller, with most lots being a bit larger than one acre.

Through the OSCS rules, which also are known as "cluster housing," relatively small lots at a site are "clustered" to maximize the amount of public open space land that is preserved at that site. Such public open space is used for passive forms of recreation such as hiking and nature study.

The OSCS rules require that at least 50 percent of a site be preserved as open space. The applicant proposes that 15.2 acres of the 28.5-acre parcel be kept as open space. In conventional subdivisions, at least 15 percent of a parcel must be designated as open space.

The owner of the Turkey Ridge site is the Bridgeport Roman Catholic Diocesan Corporation of Trumbull, with Bishop Frank Caggiano listed as the applicant of record. The proposed developer of the property is Viade Development, LLC, of Woodbridge.

The proposed development would not require any new roads, greatly simplifying the project's construction. The 11 proposed lots would have vehicular access to either Toddy Hill Road or to Turkey Roost Road. Each building lot would be served by domestic water wells and septic waste disposal systems.