Hunter Ridge Deliberations Focus On Open Space

By Andrew Gorosko

Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z) Chairman William O’Neil said August 19 the land use agency will seek legal advice from its attorney before acting on the Hunter Ridge residential resubdivision, a proposed 14-lot development on a sloped 30-acre site lying between Mt Pleasant Road and Taunton Pond.

Conflict over the development application focuses on the town’s desire for open space acreage there to provide direct public access to Taunton Pond versus Hunter Ridge, LLC’s, position that there is no legal requirement for it to donate any open space anywhere on the site for passive forms of public recreation.

In seeking to strike a compromise, the developer has offered to give the town a $172,000 fee in lieu of open space. The town uses such funds to acquire open space elsewhere. 

Developers David and Carol French, doing business as Hunter Ridge, LLC, propose the project for 30 acres on the south side of Mt Pleasant Road, just west of the Taunton Lake Drive neighborhood.

Two proposed building lots would have shore frontage on Taunton Pond, which lies downslope of Mt Pleasant Road.

Mr O’Neil noted that the town already has legal access to Taunton Pond via land near the Taunton Lake Road boat storage area for the Newtown Fish & Game Club. But that pond access is  limited, he noted. People who want to use that accessway to the pond are required to register with the town’s Parks and Recreation Department.

At an August 18 P&Z public hearing, attorney Robert Hall, representing the developer, explained that Hunter Ridge, LLC, wants to resubdivide four undeveloped lots in the Rochambeau Woods residential subdivision into 14 lots at the Hunter Ridge project. The appraised value of those four existing undeveloped lots is $1.72 million, Mr Hall said, noting that the developer would provide the town with ten percent of that sum, or $172,000, as a fee in lieu of open space. That money would be paid to the town in increments as building lots are sold in the development.

The developer has offered to donate a fee in lieu of open space to the town as a compromise gesture, while maintaining that no actual acreage donation is required, according to Mr Hall.

Mr Hall has maintained that the P&Z had an opportunity to acquire a small amount of open space at the site when the original Rochambeau Woods subdivision was approved in 1970, but it did not, and thus forfeited any opportunity to acquire open space there.

A subdivider typically donates open space land to the town or to a private land trust. The P&Z currently requires subdividers to donate at least 15 percent of the land area in a subdivision as open space.

Mr Hall told P&Z members that Hunter Ridge, LLC, would legally challenge any P&Z requirement that open space land be provided for public access to the pond. The developer is also unwilling to provide pond access to all of the lot owners in the proposed 14-lot resubdivision, Mr Hall said.

Open Space

In recently reviewing the Hunter Ridge application, members of the town’s Open Space Task Force found that no open space had been donated as part of the 1970 subdivision, so the panel has recommended that the developer donate a proposed 3.2-acre building lot with frontage on Taunton Pond as open space land.

The other proposed building lot with pond frontage is 1.9 acres. Both of those proposed lots are “rear lots,” which would have driveways extending to them from the turnaround circle at the end of  the proposed subdivision road known as Dakota Drive. The 1,400-foot-long dead-end road would extend southward onto the site from Mt Pleasant Road toward Taunton Pond.

In a June letter to the P&Z, Linda Shepard, chairman of the Borough Zoning Commission, wrote, in part, “We would like to see open space provided for this subdivision, preferably close to [Taunton Pond].”

In a June letter to the P&Z, George Benson, the town’s land use enforcement officer, wrote, in part, “The proposed [Hunter Ridge] resubdivision has to comply with the current subdivision regulations that include the 15 percent [open] space provision.”

On August 18, Mr French told P&Z members that while he is willing to donate $172,000 to the town as a fee in lieu of open space, he would challenge the P&Z requiring him to donate at least 15 percent of the land area in the development as open space acreage.

That 15 percent of the 30 acres would be 4.5 acres, meaning that the developer might lose a building lot in a resubdivision with an open space area.

At the August 18 public hearing, Elmer MacDonald of 39 Taunton Lake Road, representing the Taunton Lake Association, told P&Z members, “Public access would destroy Taunton Lake.” The body of water is surrounded by privately-owned properties.

Mr MacDonald added that public access would destroy the natural beauty of the area. Allowing public access to Kenosia Lake in Danbury has caused environmental problems, he said.

Although the town has legal access to Taunton Pond near the Newtown Fish & Game Club’s boat storage area, it is only limited access, Mr MacDonald noted. The public must obtain permission to use that accessway from the Parks and Recreation Department, he said. That area has limited vehicle parking.

Mr O’Neil said August 19 that he expects that P&Z members will be discussing whether having additional public access to Taunton Pond from open space in the Hunter Ridge development would pose environmental risks to the pond.

P&Z members have until late October to act on the Hunter Ridge proposal.

The development site is in the borough, but because the borough has no planning agency, the P&Z reviews such applications. The site has R-1 zoning, which requires minimum one-acre lot sizes.

In early 2001, Ginsburg Development Corporation Connecticut, LLC, had proposed building 110 condominiums for people over age 55 at the Mt Pleasant Road site now eyed for Hunter Ridge.

But in May 2001, citing strong neighborhood opposition to its condo construction proposal, plus uncertainty about the availability of municipal sewer service for the project, Ginsburg dropped its proposal to build there. Ginsburg is currently constructing a 96-unit age-restricted condo complex several miles to the west on a 40-acre site at 178 Mt Pleasant Road, known as Liberty at Newtown.