IWC Seeks More Design Changes For Church Project

By Andrew Gorosko

In response to an Inland Wetlands Commission (IWC) request to revise its plans for a proposed new 29,503-square-foot church off Hawleyville Road (Route 25) to reduce the project’s environmental impact on the 13.7-acre site, a church group has reworked its development plans.

But the IWC is asking the organization to make yet more design changes to further reduce the project’s effect on the local environment. The IWC guards the quality of wetlands and watercourses. There are 2.4 acres of wetlands on the church-owned site.

At a third public hearing on June 28, Grace Christian Fellowship presented to the IWC some project design changes that IWC members had requested at a June 14 public hearing. But IWC members said they want yet more revisions made to reduce the prospect of environmental problems at the site, which has a street address of 4 Covered Bridge Road.

The congregation now leases space for its existing 13,500-square-foot church about one mile away at 174 Mt Pleasant Road (Route 6). The group wants to build a new larger church to meet the needs of its expanding congregation.

Engineer Dainius Virbickas of Artel Engineering Group, LLC, of Brookfield, representing the church, described the design changes that the church has made.

Instead of constructing an above-ground stormwater retention basin on the site, which would have required the removal of many trees, the church now proposes installing underground stormwater retention structures, which would be situated beneath its parking lot. That system would include six buried lengths of five-foot-diameter pipe that would temporarily hold stormwater that accumulates on the site during rainstorms.

The design changes would leave more undisturbed land adjacent to wetlands on the site, Mr Virbickas said.  

In response to IWC concerns that there would be too much asphalt pavement on the site, the church proposed that 50 of its 198 parking spaces be surfaced with gravel instead of with asphalt. A pervious surface such as gravel allows stormwater to drain downward into the soil instead of being diverted into drainage structures.

Mr Virbickas also suggested the use of drainage ditches instead of underground drain pipes in some areas.

The IWC had recommended that the church consider having some of its parking area covered with “pervious pavers.”  Such paving stones contain voids to allow water to flow through them, but are rigid enough to allow vehicles to park atop them.

Mr Virbickas said that the use of pervious paving stones would prove impractical in terms of maintenance issues.

Considering the design changes that have been proposed by the church, approximately 126,000 square feet of the site would have hard, impervious surfaces, which is about 9,000 square feet less than in the original proposal, Mr Virbickas said.

IWC Chairman Sally O’Neil said that the church should revise its development plans to reduce the amount of impervious surfaces on the site by cutting the extent of asphalt paving there. IWC members will research whether there is some effective way to reduce the amount of asphalt needed at the site, she said.

Ms O’Neil urged the church to similarly investigate ways to minimize the amount of asphalt paving proposed for the project.

The public hearing on the church construction proposal is scheduled to resume on July 12.

Grace Christian Fellowship began operations in Newtown in 1984. The group is an interdenominational church affiliated with the RHEMA Ministerial Association International.