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Minutes 4.19.23(Queensbury ZBA Meeting 04/19/2023) 1 AREA VARIANCE NO. 13-2023 SEQRA TYPE TYPE II G. THOMAS MOYNIHAN JR. & JOAN MOYNIHAN AGENT(S) HUTCHINS ENGINEERING & JON LAPPER, ESQ. OWNER(S) G. THOMAS MOYNIHAN, JR. & JOAN MOYNIHAN ZONING WR LOCATION 81 ASSEMBLY POINT RD. APPLICANT PROPOSES TO DEMOLISH THE EXISTING HOME AND TO CONSTRUCT A NEW 3-BEDROOM HOME OF 2,760 SQ. FT. FOOTPRINT AND A FLOOR AREA OF 3,900 SQ. FT. HE SITEWORK INCLUDES PERMEABLE PAVER AREAS, STORMWATER MANAGEMENT, AND SHORELINE PLANTINGS. SITE PLAN FOR NEW FLOOR AREA. RELIEF IS REQUESTED FOR SETBACKS. CROSS REF SP 23-2023 WARREN COUNTY PLANNING APRIL 2023 ADIRONDACK PARK AGENCY ALD LOT SIZE 0.39 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 29.12-2-27 SECTION 179-3-040 JON LAPPER, LUCAS DOBIE, & TREVOR FLYNN, REPRESENTING APPLICANTS, PRESENT STAFF INPUT Notes from Staff, Area Variance No. 13-2023, G. Thomas Moynihan, Jr. & Joan Moynihan, Meeting Date: April 19, 2023 “Project Location: 81 Assembly Point Rd. Description of Proposed Project: Applicant proposes to demolish the existing home and to construct a new 3-bedroom home of 2,760 sq. ft. footprint and a floor area of 3,900 sq. ft. The site work includes permeable paver areas, stormwater management, and shoreline plantings. Site plan for new floor area. Relief is requested for setbacks. Relief Required: The applicant requests relief for setbacks for the construction of a new home. The project site is located at 81 Assembly Point Drive on a 0.41 ac parcel in a Waterfront Residential zone. Section 179-3-040 dimensional The new home is to be located 75.2 ft. from the shoreline where a 104.5 ft. setback (average of the two adjoining owners) is required. Criteria for considering an Area Variance according to Chapter 267 of Town Law: In making a determination, the board shall consider: 1. Whether an undesirable change will be produced in the character of the neighborhood or a detriment to nearby properties will be created by the granting of this area variance. Minor to no impacts to the neighborhood may be anticipated. 2. Whether the benefit sought by the applicant can be achieved by some method, feasible for the applicant to pursue, other than an area variance. Feasible alternatives may be considered limited due to the adjoining location of the existing homes and the lot shape. 3. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The relief requested may be considered minimal relevant to the code. Relief requested is 29.3 ft. 4. Whether the proposed variance will have an adverse effect or impact on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood or district. Minor to no impact to the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood may be anticipated. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self-created. The difficulty may be considered self-created. Staff comments: The applicant proposes to demolish the existing home and construct a new 3 bedroom home with a 2,760 sq. ft. footprint and a floor area of 3,900 sq. ft. The home is to be 27.6 ft. in height. The project plans indicate rain gardens and swale areas for stormwater management. The site work will include a new on-site wastewater treatment system, permeable paver driveway, stormwater management and shoreline buffering. The plans show the new home location including elevations and floor plans and a rendition of the new home.” MR. URRICO-And the Planning Board, based on its limited review, did not identify any significant adverse impacts that cannot be mitigated with the current project proposal, and that motion was passed April 18th, 2023 by a unanimous vote. MR. LAPPER-Good evening, everyone. For the record, Jon Lapper with Trevor Flynn, project architect, and Lucas Dobie from Hutchins Engineering, project engineer and the applicants, Tom and Joanie, are in the back row as well. We hope you will agree with us that we, for a change, have a simple application. The only variance that we’re seeking is the setback because the extreme distance to the one house on the (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 04/19/2023) 2 north from the lake. In this zone of course, as Roy said, it’s the average distance of the two homes or 50 feet. So 50 feet would be what we would need if it wasn’t for the two homes and what’s proposed here is 75 which is certainly with other homes in the area, and the one home on the north which is the aberration is because a while ago that’s where Assembly Point Road was along the lake. So the house was kind of unnaturally pushed back 159 feet. I’m sure that if the neighbors to the north re-built their house someday, which they probably will, they wouldn’t build it at 159 feet. This isn’t a grand house by any means. It’s three bedrooms. Tom and Joanie are downsizing. It’s first floor living with two guest bedrooms upstairs. Everything else complies. Pretty substantial landscaping along the lake which isn’t there now and all the neighbors are supportive of this. So with that I’ll just ask the architect and landscape architect to walk you through the plans. MR. DOBIE-Thank you. For the record, Lucas Dobie with Hutchins Engineering. I’m real proud of the project. Put a nice team together, put a tremendous amount of thought into it and this will be a real nice development for the neighborhood we believe. It’s kind of a tired property now with an older home which is set up with a walk out basement on the lakeside. So to make this a newer project, we’re taking, demo’ing everything on the site, all the hard surface, driveway, taking the site down a few, several feet to create a first floor level through the whole, entire property. So you will drive up into the garage, first floor level, lakeside. The patio’s at the first floor level to help with egress to the home. I believe we went the extra mile, all we could, with the permeable pavers, the permeable walks, enhanced treatment wast ewater system using the Fuji Clean technology instead of septic tanks, an enhanced treatment, and provided stormwater sizing as if it was a virgin site, not a re-development. So we really feel we went the extra mile there and it’s expensive landscaping through the site and the shoreline buffering. I’d be happy to answer any questions after the architect speaks to it. MR. FLYNN-For the record, Trevor Flynn with Flynn Design Studio. We did, from an architectural standpoint, start from the very, very beginning and looking at accessibility, keeping that first floor a master suite. Essentially the whole program located on the first floor, but there was an attempt to locate the building further away from the lake, but we were encumbered by the septic system that is in the front and the required distances and setbacks. What you can also see from the elevations to the top left, the south elevation, moving up to the second floor and two guest suites we took the best effort to actually take that second floor and pull it away from the lake as well so there’s less of an impact on the lake, too. Other than that, we fought with the setbacks, the side yard setbacks and kept the rest of the building footprint within all the other required areas and fought to keep the floor area ratio below the required. Other than that, I’ll answer any questions you guys have. MR. MC CABE-Do we have questions of the applicant? MR. KUHL-I’d have a question for Lucas. What is a Fuji Clean septic system? MR. DOBIE-That’s becoming quite popular around the lake. MR. KUHL-I haven’t heard of it before. I know Fuji for a lot of other things. If you could explain it, if the Board doesn’t mind. MR. DOBIE-It’s coming. It’s the latest and greatest technology if you will. It’s a Japanese manufacturer I believe it’s built in Maine. There’s a local distributor and it’s a reinforced poly fiberglass tank, approximately the size of a 1,000 gallon septic tank. There’s several different chambers in it, anaerobic treatment to begin with, it re-circulates and I’m not a chemist. I forgot all that in college. Anaerobic and then aerobic on the second and third cycles, which creates a high quality effluent, much higher quality coming out of it than a traditional septic tank, and then we pump up to a conventional pipe and stone absorption beds, essentially putting very clean water into the septic field which obviously provides nice benefits for the lake. MR. HENKEL-Some friends of ours put one of those on the island there, 14 mile island and they said that they could take a glass of water afterwards. I wouldn’t do it, though. MR. MC CABE-Other questions of the applicant? So at this particular time I’m going to open the public hearing and see if there’s anybody who would like to address us on this particular project. Chris? Did you know what a Fuji septic system was? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED CHRIS NAVITSKY MR. NAVITSKY-Yes. It’s a good system, both aerobic and anaerobic chambers, it provides good treatment. MR. KUHL-How much maintenance? (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 04/19/2023) 3 MR. NAVITSKY-Well you have to have annual inspections, as you do with any wastewater treatment. That’s part of the deal. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chris Navitsky, Lake George Waterkeeper. I think I just have more questions regarding the application than real opposition to the setback variance and some of my concerns I think will be more towards the Planning Board regarding six foot cuts through the site which we think do not really match what the neighborhood is, but my main question is why there are not variances required for the stormwater devices that are proposed less than 20 feet from the lake. I’m just not sure why that is the case. That’s even greater than 50% reduction from the Lake George Park Commission regulations and much less than the Town of Queensbury standards. So I’m not sure why that is, and they even have the discharge going down a steep slope right to the lake. So I don’t think that that’s a benefit at all. There is room to move those back and I don’t know why the variance is not required. There is, I do have a question on the building height. They’re right at the building height, just a couple of inches below, but the existing grade where the porch is is at 335 which is over a foot less than the elevation of 336.3 that they use. So I question how that building height is determined, and again, I have a problem with the excessive use of the permeable pavers, you know, they seem to just meet the permeability requirement, but if you look at the site hard scape, they’re at 31.2% and it’s critical that we get these permeable pavers, how will that maintenance be guaranteed, you know, can that be a requirement that there’s annual certification that those devices are cleaned to be a condition for any variances granted on the site. So those are my questions, really primarily stormwater. I just don’t understand why there’s not a variance required. Thank you. MR. MC CABE-Sure. Thank you. Is there anybody else that would like to address us on this particular project? Is there anything written? MR. URRICO-We’ve got some letters. “I own the property at 82 Assembly Pt. Rd. which is locate d, adjacent or within the vicinity of the proposed project mentioned above. I have reviewed the drawings and the application with the owners and am in support of the proposed Home and site improvements. The proposed design is suitable, situated appropriately from the lake, road and neighboring properties. The proposed design appears to have little to no negative impacts on the surrounding physical environment and no undesirable change to the neighborhood. I am urging the Zoning Board to approve the proposed application. Thank you for your consideration in this matter. Sincerely, Edward J. Baertschi” This is the same letter signed by Norma Baertschi, and that’s at 85 Assembly Pt. Rd., and the same letter, Cheryl Lamparella at 85 Assembly Pt. Rd. MR. MC CABE-So just a quick question. So, Laura, can you address the stormwater variance? MRS. MOORE-So this project is a minor project and I’m just reviewing it, and I don’t believe it needs a variance in reference to the stormwater devices within the lake only because it’s classified as a minor. I’ll clarify that in a minute. MR. MC CABE-So, Jon, would you like to respond? MR. LAPPER-Before I hand it over to the professionals to respond to Chris, I want to just say that his comments were mostly just directed to the Planning Board, site issues and those weren’t raised by the Town Engineer and, you know, were it not for the lot to the north, and that was one of the people that signed the letter in the last one, you know, 50 feet would be required and we’re over 75 feet. So it’s a nice setback. With that said usually we’re here on a small lot looking for permeability and floor area ratio and a bunch of setbacks and as we’ll hear everything has tried to be designed to avoid any variances just because that neighbor’s lot is so far back and Craig Brown, Zoning Administrator, reviewed this and determined that there weren’t any need for any other variances, and I do appreciate that Chris supports the Fuji Clean system because it is an enhanced treatment system and maintenance is part of what the engineer provides. So with that I’ll hand it first to Lucas. MR. DOBIE-Our logic with the raingardens closer to the lake is that’s the flattest part of the lake, and I agree with Laura that it’s under the minor criteria that I believe the shoreline setback is for a major project, which just got changed to 35 feet by the Town Board last week I believe, and again as I stressed earlier, we looked at a full size sizing for these and a redundant system. So there’ll be like a, the downstream part of the site, a last effort to grab the yard and everything before it goes down into the lake. So we feel that’s appropriate spots for the raingardens and if we wanted to nitpick the numbers we could take credit for the existing areas, which is allowed by Code, and reduce our stormwater. We didn’t do that. We said let’s provide the maximum that we can and most of it’s kind of off the houses and going to get absorbed into the permeable pavers and patio. So if you look at the raingardens closer to the shore as a final polishing effort if you will, and then in little weirs point at the shore, in a five inch rainfall frozen ground, that’s where the water’s going to go. So it’s an emergency outlet for the raingardens was the logic of those. MR. FLYNN-Also to add to the permeable pavers, I know that has been a sticking point saying that they will fill up with silt and salt, but actually they’re going to be heated. So they will be well maintained compared to other ones that use salt or sand. As far as the building height, we actually just indicated a higher height than required from where we are at the current elevations, just to stay safe, and we’re still (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 04/19/2023) 4 within that 28 feet, and you can actually see from that south elevation the line drawn that it’s existing grade, copy it up 28 feet and we’re well within that range. MR. KUHL-So you’re suggestion that because they’re heated they’re going to be cleaner, the pavers? MR. FLYNN-Yes, essentially I know in the past other Board members, the Planning Board, has noted that once they get sand and salt in them they start to clog up. So they’ll actually be heated. MR. KUHL-Right, but the maintenance on the pavers are as more during the non-wintertime to take the old sand and dirt out. Right? To keep the open pores or whatever you want to call them of pavers active. Okay. I realize in the winter they’re going to freeze, and if your point is they’re heated, okay, the pores will be open more, but ultimately the maintenance requirements on pavers is annual or, I don’t even know what kind it should be. I just wish I would have bought a vacuum years ago and my Ronny’s vacuum truck, because everybody comes with pavers and what’s the maintenance? And we have nobody around to check the maintenance schedule, but they should be cleaned. MR. FLYNN-Understood. I guess I’m saying we’re going above and beyond. We’re not going to have the silt and sand built up as normal to other permeable paver applications because of the heated application. MR. KUHL-I will agree to disagree. MR. FLYNN-Understood. MR. MC CABE-So at this particular time I’m going to close the public hearing. PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED MR. MC CABE-I’m going to poll the Board, and I’m going to start with Bob. MR. KEENAN-I don’t have any real issues with the project. It seems like they’re doing as much as they can to keep into the variances, or the setbacks that are required here. So I have no real issues with the project. MR. MC CABE-Dick? MR. CIPPERLY-In terms of the relief that they’re looking for, when you look at what we’re forced to look at in terms of setback it’s very minimal. So I would not have a problem at all approving their request. MR. MC CABE-Jim? MR. UNDERWOOD-I have no problem approving this one. I think, you know, the standard’s 50 foot. You’re going to be 75.2. That’s more than enough. I think you should be complimented on your plan overall. MR. MC CABE-John? MR. HENKEL-I think you’ve done a nice job of addressing this property. No doubt we’re being asked for very minimal variance. The rest can be addressed by site plan. I’m on board as is. MR. MC CABE-Ron? MR. KUHL-I agree. The way it’s presented, I have no issue with it. MR. MC CABE-Roy? MR. URRICO-I’m in favor of the project as presented. MR. MC CABE-And the request is absolutely minimal and so I support this project. So, Bob, I wonder if you could give us a motion here. The Zoning Board of Appeals of the Town of Queensbury has received an application from G. Thomas Moynihan Jr. & Joan Moynihan. Applicant proposes to demolish the existing home and to construct a new 3-bedroom home of 2,760 sq. ft. footprint and a floor area of 3,900 sq. ft. The sitework includes permeable paver areas, stormwater management, and shoreline plantings. Site plan for new floor area. Relief is requested for setbacks. Relief Required: (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 04/19/2023) 5 The applicant requests relief for setbacks for the construction of a new home. The project site is located at 81 Assembly Point Drive on a 0.41 ac parcel in a Waterfront Residential zone. Section 179-3-040 dimensional The new home is to be located 75.2 ft. from the shoreline where a 104.5 ft. setback (average of the two adjoining owners) is required. SEQR Type II – no further review required; A public hearing was advertised and held on April 19, 2023. Upon review of the application materials, information supplied during the public h earing, and upon consideration of the criteria specified in Section 179-14-080(A) of the Queensbury Town Code and Chapter 267 of NYS Town Law and after discussion and deliberation, we find as follows: 1. There is not an undesirable change in the character of the neighborhood nor a detriment to nearby properties because it’s including property that currently exists. 2. Feasible alternatives have been considered by the Board, are reasonable and have been included to minimize the request. 3. The requested variance is not substantial basically because of the way the setbacks are determined in this zone with the other neighboring sites being so far back is really what causes the variance. 4. There is not an adverse impact on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood or district. It’s actually an improvement to the neighborhood. 5. The alleged difficulty may be considered self-created only because of their making changes to the property, developing the property with the new building. 6. In addition, the Board finds that the benefit to the applicant from granting the requested variance would outweigh (approval) the resulting detriment to the health, safety and welfare of the neighborhood or community; 7. The Board also finds that the variance request under consideration is the minimum necessary; 8. The Board also proposes the following conditions: a) Adherence to the items outlined in the follow-up letter sent with this resolution. BASED ON THE ABOVE FINDINGS, I MAKE A MOTION TO APPROVE AREA VARIANCE NO. 13-2023 G. THOMAS MOYNIHAN, JR. & JOAN MOYNIHAN, Introduced by Robert Keenan, who moved for its adoption, seconded by Ronald Kuhl: Duly adopted this 19th Day of April 2023 by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Cipperly, Mr. Keenan, Mr. Kuhl, Mr. Henkel, Mr. Urrico, Mr. Underwood, Mr. McCabe NOES: NONE MR. MC CABE-Congratulations, you have a project. MR. LAPPER-The applicants really appreciate it.