Falmouth Planning Board Reviews Canopy Development Sketch Plan

[0:01] Chair (Planning Board): All good? We're good. Okay, great. Welcome to the Town of Falmouth October 6th Planning Board Meeting. Ethan, if you could do the roll call, please. Sure. [0:20] Ethan (roll call clerk): Alvaro Sebastian. Here. Jamie Mason. Here. David Sinnott. Here. Peter Kenlon. Here. Karen Farber. Here. Bruce Hillfrank. Here. Here, Eli Markham. Here. [0:34] Chair (Planning Board): Terrific. We have a quorum, full attendance, and our two alternates will not be voting this evening, but please participate in the conversation, raise questions at the appropriate time, et cetera. So first up is item one, which is approval of the minutes from the September 1st meeting. Do I hear a motion? [1:00] Ethan (roll call clerk): Any changes? We approve the minutes from the September meeting. Second. Thank you. [1:06] Chair (Planning Board): Peter moved in second at any discussion seeing none all in favor all opposed great we are good so tonight we have one regular agenda item which is kind of different given how short our meetings have been the last four months this is u.s route one canopy development just as a reminder to everyone this is a pre-application sketch plan review the point of this is for us to get an idea an understanding of where the development proposal is where it's going for the applicant to understand what may be expected, get questions answered, concerns raised. No decisions are being made, no formal decisions being made. We'll start with, just because we haven't had one of these in a few months, we'll start with the applicant making a presentation. Then we'll have time for the board to ask questions of the applicant. Then we will open it up to public comment, both in the room and online, and when that's done, bring it back to the board for discussion, questions, the applicant, if they've got questions for us. We do have, expect a waiver request as part of this, and so that will be part of the later conversation. So with that, I call the [2:52] Peter Beagle: applicant forward, please. Good evening. My name is Peter Beagle. I'm a site planner, landscape architect with Land Design Solutions in Cumberland, and I'm here tonight representing the Canopy Development LLC. With me tonight is John Maher, Andrea Casanova, and Chris Dyer from the Canopy Development LLC, and that LLC was put together for this development. The people involved with that is John Maher, the owner of the project, and he's just going to say a couple words about his relationship to that parcel and this side of town. [3:34] Chair (Planning Board): Okay. Thank you. Hey, good evening. [3:37] John Maher: Thank you for having us tonight, and I appreciate and look forward to working with you on this exciting project. I'll just take a minute to introduce ourselves as the sponsor of the project and let Peter do the presentation on the substance of the proposal. proposal. I'm John Maher, as Peter said. Andrea is my daughter, and Chris works with us in our group. And we came to know it on this property kind of in a roundabout way, and I've been for years trying to contemplate what the appropriate use of it is. I know some of you people, some of you I don't, but my family has been in town a long time. I'm third generation. Andrea's children are fifth generation, and we all live in very close proximity to this particular parcel. I'm a lifelong runner. I've run through this parcel for literally 50 years and probably thousands of times. So we're not an out-of-town developer. We're genuinely interested in finding an appropriate use for this property, something that's relatively permanent, that will prevent overuse of this property over the long term. And we think we've come up with something that respects the guidance that we've gotten from you folks and the ordinances that exist in the town. We look forward to working with you to fine-tune that to meet the satisfaction of those most involved in it. So again, that's who we are. We're excited about the project. We're looking forward to your comments and being responsive to an appropriate use for the property. Thank you. Thank you. All [5:24] Peter Beagle: right. Let me get my little, the top buttons, the green circle, is that? Yeah. Or the hand. Okay. So, there have been a couple starts and stops with this parcel. parcel. John purchased this parcel in 2016. I was involved back then. We had the wetlands, you know, all the preliminary stuff. And then next thing you know, they're looking at, you know, Route 1 South study was going on, then Route 1 North. And so I said, okay, well, we should hold off until that gets ironed out. And then on the heels of the Route 1 North study was the update to the comprehensive plan. So in between there, we thought we had an idea and we'd move forward and we usually got the wetlands delineated and then we stepped back. And so here we are with our third wetland delineation and we think with those plans all being done that we have a good idea here. We have the context map up here right now, so you can see our parcel. We've got this little finger that comes down here. We've got about 52 acres. We have frontage on Route 1. We've got frontage on Northbrook Drive. We've got a little office park building right here. We've got the senior living center, Sedgewood Commons, over here. We've got Applegate condominium units here. Here. We have Knight Street. We've got Bricker Road, Preservation Drive, the tail end lot on Driftwood Lane. Okay, yeah, I got a little bit lost there. Here's Preservation Drive right here. And then we have the town open space along here. We've got Sullivan Tire right here. Northbrook, Norton Brook comes through our property. Right here is where it crosses Northbrook Drive. That culvert is currently being designed and replacement happening through the town Public Works, which is, I think, a major undertaking. And when we get just on the side of our property over here, we run into Mill Creek. So there's a little bit of a flood area that comes up into our parcel, and that's Mill Creek area right in, right in there. They're extensive trail system through here as John was talking about and through the town parcel we're from our site down to route one and into the shops area is about a mile and if you went kind of the other way you've got about there's a from the town from our land through the through the town open space down to the town little parking area and connection onto 77 to town landing would be about I think two miles so it gives you a little sense of context there so could I advance, there we go. So this, the boundary survey, I don't have too much to show you on this parcel, just it's 52 acres, that shows you the boundary of the parcel. All that information is going to be on other plans coming up. So we did have the standard boundary survey done. We did actually run into a little. If you were looking at this on the town mapping, this area over in here shows as owned by the town. It's right where the little pond from Knight Street projects down in here, but that is, in fact, part of this parcel. So we did iron out that discrepancy. But if you were looking at this on town mapping, you would wonder what was happening there. Year, this parcel is shown as a part of the growth area on the comprehensive plan, and that the updated parcel so it is shown as a growth area. The surrounding residential areas are shown as non growth areas. So the planning conference of planning update folks obviously thought this parcel was ready for something to be happening there. So these photos just give you a little sense of when you're up in this parcel what you're looking at for people that haven't been there and in the kind of development. Area off Northbrook Drive, those you know those that kind of open woods is what you what you see. So you can get up in there and you can see for quite a while it's pretty open. This a lot of the wetlands that are up in there were kind of man-created. They are not heavily vegetated that you might think of when you think of a lush wetland, and that's what you're you're what you're seeing right here. One of the and I'll let's say make note of that image a little later on when I talk about responding to. Some of town staff's comments, there was a comment about if a wetland needed a setback, if it was really a low-value wetland and did not classify as a wetland drainage way, it might need a setback. Anyway, this is that wetland. So when you're walking out there, some of those are actually hard to see exactly what they are. Very similar to when we did the site walk by the police station, the Skittery Woods Project. Some of those wetlands that were in some of the old tote roads and whatnot did not have a lot of vegetation and were really just kind of drainage depressions. Okay, there we go. Okay. Up top is S4 stream. It's in our, kind of our, comes out of the large wetland on the plan, but you can see it looks like, you know, it was probably excavated, man-made at one point. Not much water in there. Down below another image, and now this is near the end of the perennial stream, and you can see we're in an area where it has much more undergrowth. So the first photo I showed was the more the clearer woods up in the area where we end up saying is a good area for development. When we get in the area that we're proposing to preserve and leave as open space, you get you know you get more of this vegetation typical trail on the top photo. So these aren't just you know little blaze trails through the. Woods, these are most of them are pretty, you know, pretty nice open trail. The photo on the bottom is the pond, you know, we have it labeled pond, so you're thinking water, but when I was walking out there it was pretty dry and really just these sedges and, you know, wetland grass. It looks like it's set up for hockey in the winter with some lights and hockey nets over to the side, so I'm imagining that it does flood at some point, and folks up there do take advantage of it. Top picture is the perennial stream, I guess, again, the S4 stream, and it must have some little underground spring or something because what I showed you originally was totally dry coming out of the wetland, which is a little odd, and then farther down we have a segment that actually has some water in it, so a little different, and then we have the bottom picture here is the tote road that comes up from the Route One area, and you can see some old culverts laying in Norton Brook, and then the tote road makes its way up through the, through the property, just another image of the top image is a little wetland area in a dugout section beside the tote road, and then you have a image of Norton Brook, there are the culverts that are just kind of washed out sitting there in Norton Brook, so here we have our site analysis plan, so we went through everything we could think of, our site inventory plan, we had a vernal pool investigation done, and these, so these were all updated, we've done a number of vernal pool studies, a number of wetland studies, like I said, a couple sedge studies, but these are all recent, these are all 2026 of the information that we submitted, so vernal pools, none were found, wetland delineation, the report was in the packet. And the kind of funny thing is, and we'll talk about this more when we get to the soils, but so the green area are the high-value wetlands. So you've got a high-value wetland here, and you've got a high-value wetland down here. The purple are the low-value wetlands. And I think this area was really a lot of excavation done, a lot of kind of regrading and dumping of materials done. And kind of going out of order of my little lineup here, but I think many years ago, and I think, you know, John's probably about my age, and, you know, he's been running these trails so things haven't changed for say you know 60 years. But if you look at the tree survey and there's some trees out there that are pine trees that are 20 something inch in size and I'm guessing those maybe are 80 years old. So people were out here maybe the 1940s or something like that and doing excavating and looking for sandy and gravelly soils I believe for development over along 77 and over along the Turnpike area. And so they would find these gravelly, sandy seams. They would, you know, take whatever soil they didn't want. That gets piled up to the side. They take the soils they want. And, you know, that was back in the time where they didn't have all the nice equipment we have today. So, you know, you probably weren't going to take your shovel and your rake and smooth this stuff out. Anyway, that's why when you get to the soils mapping and soils report, you're going to see made land, cut fill area, and if you look at a Cumberland County soil survey mapping, and the mapping was done in 61 through 66, you'll see a little designation on this area that says a gravel pit. So anyway it's just it's very interesting. It was probably the most interesting soil report I've read. Usually your eyes are drooping by the time you get through the first page but that one was actually pretty interesting to go through anyway moving on variable sedge pointed out in the main natural areas program. We had Lauren Stockwell, who's a botanist. She went out there the first time we did it a number of years ago. She's retired, but she was still game to come back and work with us, so she came out again this time, and she was very interested in where it maybe had moved, and it likes a little sunlight, so if you had a blowdown, you know, and the canopy opened up a little bit, it can migrate around a little bit. So anyway so she went back out with her partner and they resurveyed and what we have here is the updated we show the updated areas not a little different but you know still pretty similar we show the high intensity soil mapping class B that I was just talking about we have the tree survey done by Chris Dyer over there, hundreds of trees, quite a few hours spent out there. He probably knows the property better than most by now. We have a zone line that cuts through this property, and the zone line is 1,200 feet off the Route 1 center line is the way that was set. So we are Route 1 North over on this side, and we're RA, RCZO over on this side. We have approximately 25.9 acres on the Route 1 North side, and we have approximately 26.3 acres on the Residential A side. We contacted Maine Historic Preservation Commission. mission. They had nothing in their database that they were concerned a project would impact. Contacted the Maine Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. We have a note that was in your package. They talked about bats, which they usually talk about in forested area to be concerned about. They talked about protecting the streams, and they talked about wading bird habitat, at which if you look at the mapping is kind of down in this area with the mill with milk creek utilities we have utilities in northbrook drive let's see so moving on from so that's moving from site inventory to site analysis so we have soil wise just touching on that one more one more time we've got made land borrow pit cut fill like i said the cumberland county had us labeled as a gravel pit majority of wetlands meet the definition of low value variable sedge we have seven areas three large areas and four small areas we also had seeing where those were so you can't you know you're not going to be able to see this but the sedge is the orange areas right so we've got a pretty large sedge area here pretty large sedge area here pretty large sedge area here we got a couple small areas right here and we got a couple small areas right here. So I asked Lauren Stockwell to include, you know, could you transplant these things? Wondering if we're, you know, knowing we're proposing to be developing in this area about transplantability or ways to encourage, you know, more growth in one of these areas trying to offset any impacts that we may have to those smaller areas so she did provide guts guidance on transplanting the sedge and also like i said i believe there are ways to enhance these other areas as well on the streams again we have norton brook that runs right through our property which is really our i would say The main feature of this property on the Sebago Technics wetland and stream report, it's identified as S1, identified by DEP as a threatened stream. You can, there's other information about it that's in the Casco Bay Frontal Drainage Area Watershed Plan that the town's having, done, and it runs into Said Mill, Creek, you know, right after it exits our property. We have a perennial stream on our property, so this is the S4 perennial stream, so running out of this wetland we have the S4 and this is what i showed photographs of so the segment that looked like it had been dug man-made it was right up in right up in here and then the segment that had water in it was farther down here but that's a perennial stream and then we have over here we have an intermittent stream right on our border here and there are a couple intermittent stream sections associated with Norton Brook known as s2 s3 s5 and s6 we have for slopes we have the eastern portion up in here is fairly you know fairly flat the portion along Norton Brook, and we have a number of drainage ways and other things happening, so you know, it's hard to say exactly what the slopes are. It's a mix of a little bit of everything from steep to flat in some areas, but it's all associated with Norton Brook and little drainage ways. The area inside the red here all has a fairly consistent slope of between 4% and 7%, so all very manageable from a development standpoint. And then we have the various man-made ravines and mounds from the past earth-moving activities out there. As I said, the Maine Historic Preservation Commission had no concerns. Maine Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, BATS, Mill Creek had some wading bird habitat. They're concerned about buffers for streams and using best practices for any stream crossings. And then Main Natural Area with the variable hedge sedge concerns, the tree survey that we did, there were three dominant species in the, so the tree survey, as staff pointed out in their memo, we were not that clear about it, but it really was this area that we, about 20 acres here in the middle, that we were proposing for development, so we had 35% of that, the trees over 15 inch caliper were hemlock, 28 were eastern white pine, 24 were oak, and then you had a much smaller percent of, you know, maple and Aspen were next with, I don't know, seven percent and five percent, and then you had a mix of birch, beach, and ash kind of rounding things out. We show kind of a thicker line, we show some of the trails that are run through the parcel. As I said, extensive, you know, trail network and runs on to the town, connects to the town, open space where there are other trails and actual trail connection off Route 77. Again, we have our zone line right down the middle. We have the office park over here and Sedgwood Commons, you know, from our development area. If you're right in this area you can, you could see through, we could look through and see into their, you know, back parking lot a little bit, they're building, and if you were in their parking lot you would be looking into, you know, our area development wise over in, over in here. 9th Street we've got quite a ways from this lot over to the back of our red line is about 650 feet. The lot's preservation drive, you know, corner of the preservation drive lot over to our red line is about 300 feet. And then a few went over up to, you know, Applegate, the corner of the Applegate parcel down to our development areas about 500 feet. So it seems like views in and out of the site are fairly limited. We shouldn't be bothering too many people. They're mostly going to be looking at trees. Again, we're approximately 17 acres, 17 to 20 acres in this area. Site access, we've got, we connect on, we have frontage on Northbrook Drive, right past the sewer pump station is one place where we potential access and then we have access on route 1 so both those are viable. Site distance is good here. We have our existing resource and site analysis plan and this doesn't tell you anything too much different other than you get a little better handle of, you know, the development that's around us and again we've got kind of office park development over around on Northbrook around this area we've got Sedgwood Commons here, we've got Applegate over here, then we have the residential, single-family residential homes of Night Street, Preservation Drive, Driftwood Lane, Rain, Ricker Road around over here, and then we have town open space here, Sullivan Tire and other Route 1 businesses here, and other kind of office business stuff on the other side of Route 1. The other thing here that's a little bit interesting is just these arrows represent surface drainage, watershed drainage. So you can see this is, you know, draining down this way. We've got drained, obviously Norton Brook is draining this way. We've got our site is draining down, you know, this way. So those arrows, the drainage arrows, are helpful. Our concept plan, it comes out of all that information. We're showing access here from Northbrook Drive up into the site, access from Route 1 up into the site. We have our, you know, our A zone which allows some development through the RCZO. A conservation subdivision is your only option for the RA area. The Route 1 North area, option for development there is a residential plan development. So we've got two different types of development that we need to work together in this concept plan. We're showing the zone line. We're utilizing the ordinance section that allows you to move the zone line 30 feet towards the smaller area district when the zone line splits, goes through a parcel that has two zones in it. So we have done that here. We went through the net residential density calculations. The calculations for the RA over on this side had 44 units allowed. We're showing 10. I mean, some of that's a function. The math shows you one thing and then your site, as you know, you get something totally different because of whatever constraints you happen to be dealing with. But anyway, the math says you'd be allowed 44 units we have found a way to have 10 lots the RA requires twelve point five acres of open space we're providing twenty point eight over on the other side there route one north side which is the residential plan development that math allows you 115 units we're proposing 24 we're proposing up in the front here an area for a duplex development and we were thinking that six duplexes might fit there for a total of 12 units and then we show 12 single family lots. We've got, you know, our entrance road comes in. We have a road right along the zone line and then we have a little spur road right here. The 10 RA conservation lots are approximately 14,000 square feet to 33,000 square feet and these things could all change. This is all very conceptual but just to give you a kind of magnitude of what we're looking at for a lot size. One of the things we were trying to do was have the lots be at least enough width so you didn't have the garage Right in front, you know, you've seen a lot of homes lately that on the narrower lot, if you want to have a garage, you end up with a little bit of house in the front, a lot of garage in the front, and then you utilize the space behind the garage for living space. So we were trying to not do that. These lots are approximately 85 feet wide. So that was no hard and fast reason for that, just thinking design-wise down the line, thinking of what types of homes we thought would work in here. On the Route 1 north side, we've got the same thing. Lot sizes about 85 feet wide. There are about 14,000 to 25,000 square foot lots. Having the duplexes allow us, and the duplexes are only allowed in the residential plan develop in the, you know, the Route 1 north side, they're not allowed in the conservation subdivision, so helping us get our unit count up a little bit to help spread the infrastructure cost over more units, the duplexes help us, and I think they also help when you're looking through the comprehensive plan and they're talking about varieties of housing and housing types that incorporating some of the duplexes in this development helps provide that little something different type of housing for some that wants to downsize or have a little less maintenance and also have a little bit less cost, so we felt good about working that, working that in here, so it helped on a couple different fronts. The RCZO, as you know, requires a perimeter buffer. So this was one of our big challenges that has taken a lot of thought and a lot of circling around and trying to figure out. So obviously it's very easy around the perimeter around here, but then you have a perimeter buffer or right through the middle of your development. So you have house lots that are, if you drove down that street, you would know one side from the other. However, one side is a resource conservation development. One side is a residential plan development. Resource conservation side is supposed to have a buffer. So trying to figure out how to deal with that. If you had that beside your road, then the first 50 feet of your, everybody's lot is a buffer, meaning everybody's house has to be, you know, way back, so instead of you having woods, a natural area back there, you end up, you know, eating into that space versus pulling your, pulling things a little farther forward and keeping more of that area in the back, you know, your private lot area and that area transitioning into the open space. So the ordinance does provide for, you know, access roads through the buffer. Obviously, we're sure, you know, that I don't know that was really contemplated, but I'm not sure what I just did. I just made that smaller somehow. Can I make that a little – yeah, there we go. So our thought was, okay, if we could put that road in the buffer, that would be one way to get rid of the buffer and address the streetscape on lots on both sides. And actually I'm going to back up one moment here because one thing I neglected to show on the so here if you look at the red so the contour lines that run through here those are the five I think it's the five foot contour lines that we left on but you can see they pretty much they're pretty consistent running diagonal just like my little green blob is going so it's a pretty consistent, that 4% to 7% slope going across that site. And the reason that I go there is because of the criteria, our roads working with the topography. I'm a landscape architect. I hate straight lines. I would love to be sweeping that through there, but trying to balance out what we're allowed to do, what we can do, and working with the land. So I don't really have a problem saying that we really are working with the land where we just have that consistent slope. If we had our brothers there, we would put a sweep in there, but we would be manufacturing, you know, that sweep. It's not that we would be going around something and weaving through, use Eagle's Lane, if you remember that subdivision. We had kind of a big mound out there, and that worked great to kind of sweep our road around. So you know normally you're looking for some feature or some something topographically to help you with those curves here we don't really have it so anyway we're we've proposing that the road be in that buffer to help us deal with the buffer and those Lots. [Chris Meaney: Trails.] As you know John said his family's very interested in the type of development goes here they've been walking the trails they still do we are very interested in the trails being maintained and enhanced and still you know people having full use of trails going through the system and think that will be a great benefit for anybody that lives here you walk out your back door you're in the open space you could easily hop on a trail and go wherever the you know trails you know take you so that is kind. Of a no-brainer for this, for this site traffic, we did have a traffic study, preliminary traffic study done, which was not done in time for you folks to have it in your package. But what it did tell us was the trip generation from the 22 single-family homes and the 12 duplexes would have a total daily trips of 280. There would be 24 a.m. Peak hour trips with six entering the site and 18 exiting. The evening p.m. Trips were 27 with 17 entering and 10 exiting. That the peak hour trips be under 100, so a traffic movement permit would not be required. We asked the traffic engineer, as you read, we would love to talk about a waiver for just having a one entrance off North Brook Drive. So we asked them specifically if we just had one entrance off North Brook Drive, is that going to be a problem? And they looked at the trip generation capacity analysis and said that would not be a problem. They would maintain good Levels of service, and they did that for projected traffic for 2031, saying takes a year to go through the approval process, takes a few years for this to build out. They also factored in, I think, a couple projects that are coming online that will impact traffic along route one. So they took that, took all that information into account, and they said Northbrook Drive intersection would operate at good levels of service during both peak hours. Route one would have not have a problem accommodating the Additional residential trips. There are no high crash locations within the vicinity of the site, so access and traffic should not be an issue for this. The site comprehensive plan, looking at that, I, you know, there initially it starts out with the, six pillars, and I think it seemed like this proposed project could kind of hit on five of those. I think, you know, the natural resource protection with what we have on site, the sedge wetlands, streams, that through, you know, good stored development and Practices that we can protect those, and with the open space being provided, that the natural resource protection would be something we can, we can do. Respecting physical character of the established residential areas, and I think by, you know, having our, you know, duplex area up here by Northbrook in the, and the more developed area, and then blending into the single family here where we're abutting, you know, single family here, that our proposed development does respect that physical character of the Established areas fostering development of village centers, and you know, I think we're in a growth area, so I think we're almost by default adding residences to that growth area there near Route One as the sidewalks and trails make their way, you know, better connections to us. I think that this project hits that. Also encourage more diverse housing options to increase livability, and I think the single family plus the duplexes hits that note. And then enhance infrastructure for recreation, multi-mold transportation connectivity, and I think if we, you know, maintain that existing trail system and add to it, enhance it, that would be another good thing. We said we'd like to talk about a waiver for the access from only Northbrook Drive. That would be, we'd be looking at a 26-foot dead end. The ordinance is 1,500. So the 1,500 is measured from right here because Northbrook Drive is a dead end. So you've got 600, I can't remember the exact number, but 600 and something feet up to here or another 600 something feet up to here. 1,500 feet takes you right to about there. So the benefits of having the dead-end waiver is we don't cross Norton Brook, which, you know, I think environmentally, anytime you don't have to cross the stream, it's a, it's a benefit. It's a cost benefit to us not having to cross that stream and not having to build. This is 1160 linear feet of road, and so that's really just, you know, just connecting. So that's about three-quarters of an acre of impervious area, so we save on, we don't have to build that, and that doesn't have to be, you know, stormwater running off that and being treated, and you know, it just would go away. So that would be a benefit. Northbrook Drive traffic wise can handle the traffic for a corner lot. DoT generally is favors that you exit onto a lesser road. This is a urban compact, so DoT really doesn't have a say over this. This is the town of Falmouth actually controls what happens here in the urban compact, but just as a DOT standard, they're looking for entrance onto a lesser street. And I highlighted in our documentation the section that, you know, I just have had, I know I've been here before and we've talked about dead ends and waivers, and there's been some reluctance to do much of that, but I keep going back to the wording in the waiver talking about a remote location. I mean, we have a great development area down in here, and I would consider that a remote location. It's a 50-acre parcel, so I, you know, and that's why I think it hits the waiver section more than the de minimis section that talks about a 5%, you know, dimensional difference. So I really think that we hit on that section. You know, everybody else came in and did their developments, and nobody, you know, there's no, connection point left. We're the kind of the last person in, so it doesn't really leave us much. I was, I was the project manager for the Ridgewood development, and so there we had a little bit of the same situation. We had a vernal, we had a connection road, but that connection road was going to impact a vernal pool, and you know, so the decision was made, the plane board made the decision that was not worth it. And Ridgewood, if you measure the road on there, it's about 3,000 feet long. Of course, the, you know, the fire department required that all homes be sprinkled and be adequate turnaround, so there were, you know, some balancing that had to be, had to be done, but that was just, you know, a trade-off for, you know, environmental issues to for that. So anyway, so I bring that up, and then the other point in staff comments as well, even if that work, that's really only for the conservation subdivision, and you can't get that kind of a waiver for the residential plan development. That's been a little bit of our challenge with this site with those two districts. It's like every time you think you've got one thing that you can gain on, you know, one zoning side, you know, the other one's got something that challenges that. So it's, it's been a challenge sorting that all out. But what I wonder is that the section 713, or section 713, section C, which talks about the planning board having the ability to waive any of the performance standards, would allow it to in a subdivision, allow it to, you know, allow, if it was going to allow a dead-end waiver for the conservation subdivision, that it would be able to allow it for the residential plan development, which is also a subdivision. So that was my thought on that, and then I thought I should, staff had some comments, and I guess I'm closing on that. I mean, I know we have the comments from, you know, fire, police chief, public works, and you know, why wouldn't they want two Inferences, I'd want two inferences, but we're trying to hit that balance of entrance environmental, so you know, I think it's in their best interest to want that, but do we really need that? And it's, is there justification for just having the one entrance and the longer the dead end? So in response to staff had a very thorough write-up, but in response to some of these things, I think on staff page three where it talks about the proposed house lots one through four lying directly adjacent to the low-value wetland, averaging 30 feet or less than width. That was the photograph that I showed, and obviously we'll have to do a little more work on that, but I think that's one of those wetlands that we can prove that is associated with drainage in an upland and that we can respond to that. The tree surveys, you know, we can refine and do whatever needs to be done with that as we move forward. It was, you know, we were thinking we had more major concerns to try to get before you and talk about than some of the trees. But we have, like I said, we have, you know, 20 acres in the development area, trees. And as we further refine the design, we'll take a closer look at what trees are impacted and where they are. And we have no problem going outside the red lines, depending on where development goes, to get a better handle on that as needed. The town open space bicycle and pedestrian plan, you know, one of the things we're very excited about on this parcel is the trail system. So that's, you know, that's next steps, but that's kind of a no-brainer for us to keep enhancing and preserving the trails that are out there. Again, road working with the site, and again, I think we are, I think we're doing a decent job. I mean it's just it's a function of getting lucky with the contours that we've got a straight line but the contours are actually you know very consistent across that portion of the site so that was just one of those things working in our working in our favor we do realize that we will need a kind of a master plan if you will of how this is all working out we really didn't spend too much time on the route one parcel route one end of the parcel just because that's not really part of what we're doing at the moment but we know when we come back that we will need to show how that's all being dealt with and I think so I think in my previous discussion I have covered the other items that staff commented on so I guess that's kind of a summary great [54:05] Chair (Planning Board): Thank you. I'm still open it up to questions, clarifications the board members may have, anyone? [54:18] Dave Sinnott: Dave, yeah, sure, appreciate the mix of the duplex and single-family and the density in the growth area. I think in general that makes sense. I'm quite concerned about the environmental impacts, especially to Norton Brook and explicitly the filling of the ditches, swales, whatever you want to call them, along multiple portions, but especially in that duplex area, there's a pretty prominent one, and then through Lot 11, 10, 7. I wonder if in your iterations you had considered options that would not require as much fill, because that's pretty impactful to what's considered an at-risk stream. [55:02] Peter Beagle: Yeah. So those, I think there are two things. Hopefully, so those are pretty big sculpted ravines. I think if you, know, backed a truck up and dumped a load of dirt in there,, you wouldn't see much difference. So any, even that we show those in the lots, we would like to be developing, siting houses or, you know, working with those as much as possible. I don't think that, or I think there are ways that we can, whatever development happens around those, we can protect that, the stream. I think if you, walk in there and you walk in the bottoms of these there's you know there's no erosion there's no sign that they're actually carrying much water if you if you actually a good one is the one that right up in here if you chase that up it just kind of fizzles out when you get to the you know the property line and I don't know I you know I think it's because these ours were all kind of dug out and then you know people came in and developed and kind of filled and did whatever they were we're doing but it's It's like these ravines, they just kind of end, and they just kind of fizzle out. It's like, all right, so why was that there, and what is that doing? The trees down in the bottom are not undermined, so it's not like they're really curing water. It's really kind of bizarre, and I think it all goes back to the land being excavated and hauled out and soil moved around. I would love to see an aerial photograph from 1930 or 40, whenever that was happening, but I have not been able to find one. [56:53] Dave Sinnott: In the ordinance, as you know, it calls out protection of steep slopes. So maybe in future iterations, having a bit more detail around those steep slopes in terms of where we actually site buildings and clearing. And my other question is around kind of the nature of the development. If you'd be planning to clear cut pretty much within the red boundary and build, or would this be a more targeted removal of trees, especially considering the tree survey, which is only within the red bounds? [57:24] Peter Beagle: Yeah, I think it would be more select. But I, you know, I would not want to stand here and tell you that wrote, you know, so the road. Right. We're going to have 24 foot width of pavement. You've got a landscape median, you've got a sidewalk, you've got public water, public sewer, underground water, underground sewer, underground electric, that always eats up that 50 feet. So I can pretty much say that 50 feet is going to be cleared. And then transitioning to your lots, driveways, you know, 85-foot lots. Lots. So I think probably a lot of the area closer to the road and area closer to that where people are building would be cleared. Hopefully, you know, backyards and whatever, that would all be, you know, handled differently. [58:19] Dave Sinnott: One more request might be that as you continue to overlay the tree survey again with kind of like a do not disturb area to look at which of those high caliber trees could be saved in the development process. Yeah, for sure. Any [58:38] Chair (Planning Board): questions? Yes. [58:40] Eli Markham: Eli, I guess have you considered having more duplexes on the side that allows duplexes on the what on the left side where you're allowed to have duplexes? Have you considered having more [58:49] Peter Beagle: than just the section up at the top? Yeah, well, we thought, you know, that just kind of lended itself so the dude that's the duplex area and we thought, you know, having the single family kind of next to the single family over here I made sense. So we were, that was, that was kind of our basis for a design. So [59:19] Peter Kenlon: this is clearly a challenging site physically and then throw into that the zoning issue, recognizing that this, you know, creates a whole host of other issues. I'm just curious if you considered seeking some kind of zoning change. [59:43] Peter Beagle: Yes, we did talk about that, and it seemed like that you're more likely to get a zone changed to the RA, so it'd be an easy move, right? You move the zone line down to kind of the Norton Brook area, and you, that all becomes RA, so you have a conservation subdivision, but then you potentially are giving up your duplexes. So yeah, it's, you know, we, have kind of had our heads spinning with this for, quite a while. It's every time you think you're on to something, you find out you're not. Just to follow up on that [1:00:26] Chair (Planning Board): there is the option of a contract, so not just a stone line movement, although it's not straightforward. I'm not, yeah, just that if you did, if it were all [1:00:41] Eli Markham: conservation zone, if I'm understanding correctly, you could get a waiver for the dead-end Street being longer for the entire thing, for the entire area, right? Because that is allowed for conservation zones. [1:00:55] Peter Beagle: Well, we're, we're thinking that section C of that 713 section would allow you to grant us a waiver for the, for the residential plan development section also. OK, [1:01:14] Chair (Planning Board): we'll have that conversation after we've gotten through questions and clarifications. [1:01:21] Dave Sinnott: Dave, go ahead. Sure, I guess if we're talking roads, a couple items. One is, you know, we have a minimum distance between intersections, and I'm wondering if you've looked at the minimum distance between your proposed random road, I guess we'll call it for now, and Northbrook, and it's interesting, is it changes depending on the street type, and the street types are called out really based on dwellings that they serve, which I think would actually put it at a sub-collector level and 400 feet distance between them, which looks close, but just making sure you consider that. [1:02:03] Peter Beagle: Yeah, so which one are we talking about? We're talking about this one right here? [1:02:07] Dave Sinnott: No, 2 Route 1. [1:02:08] Chair (Planning Board): On the Route 1 side. [1:02:10] Dave Sinnott: Yeah, so where you place that road that crosses the brook, that needs to be, you know, the way I'd read the ordinance, 400 feet from another intersection on the same side. it's up to there yeah and i'm not sure you don't have it but it'd be interesting on future plans i'd be a good one to label just to make sure that 's considered yes yep and i have not i have [1:02:31] Peter Beagle: not measured that, I couldn't tell you what that is. I think we're all right, but I, yeah, it looks [1:02:36] Dave Sinnott: Real close, yeah. And the other one is the distance from the intersection of that same road to your, I will say, buffer road, if you will, from that down to the very end creates another dead end. So from there, and then you're going up to the intersection, I wonder what that length is as well. So from this, from that point to the inner, and then next intersection up to the right here, the next road, yeah. So it starts a new dead-end road where you have that intersection. Just a little bit down? Where the tote road is. So from there down to the end creates a new dead-end, even with the road that's in there? [1:03:28] Peter Beagle: Yeah. So, yes, we're under 1,500 feet. Okay. So that is under? 1,500 to there, and then we're like 1,100 down to here. So down to that. Okay, so it's 1100 for the intersection, so that gives you the 26, 2600 from Northbrook up, down, and down to there, that gives you the 2600. Okay, and then the very bottom of the road looks like it [1:03:54] Dave Sinnott: goes into the buffer towards the town. Is that something just a artifact of drawing? Yes, that would all be figured out. Yes, okay. And it looks like maybe it's changed on ours, but on our plan the steep slopes are labeled 15 grade and 15 grade. Yeah, okay, right, is that 20 and 15 [1:04:14] Peter Beagle: right, or 25, or the top one was supposed to be greater than 25. Okay, it's if you, the site inventory had the label screwed up, the site analysis plan I got it right for whatever [1:04:27] Dave Sinnott: reason. That's fine, no worries. Okay, aren't [1:04:33] Charlie Katz-Levy: you proposing though to not put in the [1:04:36] Peter Beagle: road directly from Route One? Yes, we would love to not put that in. [1:04:45] Speaker J (unidentified): So I mean it just looks like a great site, definitely. I mean I like the fact that it's, it's hidden, and you know, avoiding that entrance on Route One makes a lot of sense from the cost perspective and environmental perspective. I think that my concern is also I read in the documents that there's a plan to replace the culvert at some point from the town, or some repairs in the future on the North Rook entrance. So if that was, if we, if the town doesn't approve or approves not having that access in Route 1, right, and that culvert gets replaced at some point, right, with only one entrance, is there any other possibility to, add another access on that area maybe to, avoid, I mean, to, prevent from closing the only access, right, if the town has to, do anything there? [1:05:36] Peter Beagle: I think the towns well I don't know I was in contact with Justin early he was wondering you know if we ended up with two entrances is there a way to work the culvert replacement with our construction and obviously we're hoping not to have that route one entrance but I think our timing may be after the town I mean I think the town's in the middle of the design and engineering and getting that culvert dealt with. So I'm thinking that's going to be ahead of us, and that would all be probably done. [1:06:14] Speaker J (unidentified): I mean, my concern is that, is that it doesn't, okay, it doesn't get approved having the other access, fine with one access. I appreciate the traffic report that you provided because that was one of my concerns. But then in the future, the replacement has to happen, and then is on the town the cost of somehow providing an alternative for the residents to get out during that moment of the culvert replacement. And it comes back to the town, the cost. I mean, the town approves not having two accesses, but then it comes back to the town, the cost of, you know, the culvert replacement and providing access to the residents. So the problem comes back to us and to the taxpayers. [1:06:56] Peter Beagle: Well, the town's going to have to keep half. I mean, I think they're going to have to provide – you've got all the Northbrook, you know, working people and all the – there's quite a few people that work and live in Sedgewood Commons and what's happening up there. So I think the town's got a logistical challenge there to replace half of that at a time. I'm sure Justin Early's tearing his hair out figuring out how that's all going to work. But that's – yeah, I understand your concern. [1:07:28] Speaker J (unidentified): Or maybe a Y entrance where you have two coming to the same, just some suggestions there. [1:07:36] Chair (Planning Board): Yes, Ethan, did you have something you wanted to throw out? [1:07:40] Ethan (roll call clerk): Just to clarify for the record, I was looking at the land use table for RA, and it looks like duplexes or two-family dwellings are an allowed use in the RA. So they are a conditional use, so they would require Board of Zoning Appeals approval, but there is an ability to put in two-family units in the conservation subdivision portion of the project, just to clarify that for the record. The only other thing I would also have the opportunity to clarify for the record, just as it relates to the Ridgewood project that was referenced, that was a very unique project. It's about 20 years old, and it took a while to get through the planning board, a couple of years. But the history to that was the project went through its sketch plan approval, several iterations of preliminary review. It got approved with preliminary review by the planning board with a street connection over to Falmouth Ridges Drive, such that the project didn't exceed the 1,500-foot dead-end road length limit. But because the type of development mechanism that was used, which no longer exists in the ordinance today, was called an open space residential district, it required a town council approval after the planning board issued its preliminary approval to the project. And when it got to the town council, the town council put a condition on the project that the planning board was prohibited from having a street connection over to Falmouth Ridges Drive. So just to, at the end of the day, the project did receive a waiver, but it was a convoluted process to get there, and due to a, the town council prohibiting the Planning Board from allowing the road connection. So just to add some additional background context. Yeah, thank you. Are there any other questions before [1:09:40] Chair (Planning Board): Before we open this up for public comment and questions? Okay, great. We definitely have a list of people who are online. I don't know. Let's start with the online people, Lisa. If you wish to speak, if you're online and you wish to speak, if you could raise your hand or if you're on the phone. I'm not seeing anything, but in case we're having technical difficulties, let's shift it over to the live audience. Is there anyone here in the room who would like to comment on this project? Sure. Come on up. Just please identify yourself and your address, please. [1:10:40] Charlie Katz-Levy: Sure. And I just have one comment, very brief. My name is Charlie Katz-Levy, and I live at 19 Knight Street. Okay. And I appreciate your presentation. Very well done. On the trail network, I think it would go a long way to know that the preservation of that trail system is in perpetuity. And rather than rely on association covenants, which are harder for third parties of the town to enforce, it would be great if the town or the land trust was involved in preserving the public trail access. Thank you. [1:11:29] Chair (Planning Board): Anyone else would like to speak? Please come on up. Your name and address, please. Hello. [1:11:38] Chris Meaney: Everyone, Chris Meaney, 7 Watts Farm Way. I'm also the chair of the Falmouth Conservation Commission, so just want to start off by saying thank you to Karen for coming to a Conservation Commission meeting earlier this year. We have a handful of new members. We lost our liaison to the Planning Board, so she came and met with us, and we talked about collaboration and how things work, so we appreciate you coming. So briefly, the mission of the Falmouth Conservation Commission is to protect natural resources of falmouth and improve the town's ecological integrity and wildlife diversity it increases public awareness of the intrinsic value of the town's natural resources and works to study and conserve them so i just want to say thank you to the presenter and the level of detail that was in the application that you all received and we received it was very thorough and i think it's a really good starting point apologies we didn't get you comments in advance but here i am and we'll be sure to get them to you following this meeting, but just a few initial thoughts as we, as you begin to contemplate this package. As was noted, the parcel contains multiple environmentally sensitive areas within its boundaries, including 19 delineated wetlands and six streams, of which one is Norton Brook, that's included in the Casco Bay Frontal Drainage Watershed Management Plan that was presented to the council in July. The plan indicates that there are aquatic life and pollutant concerns associated with this brook as well as in Mill Creek, and prioritizes these two for management. So we think it's important for us to consider that as we move forward. The Falmouth Conservation Commission believes runoff, including sediment pollution and roads, road salt, are all significant concerns associated with densities, with this concept plan. It's important for the town to realize that impacts from this parcel extend beyond its boundaries into Mill Creek and Casco Bay. Therefore, it's imperative as this moves forward the efforts are considered to prevent additional harm, that best management practices are utilized, and more than adequate riparian buffers and stormwater management techniques are utilized. The FCC shares concerns with Public Works as they relate to access success with the property associated with the Rome stream crossings we talked about that tonight so far. The FCC encourages the applicant to consider ways to improve the water quality as well as the integrity of aquatic organisms that utilize the Water bodies any road stream crossing that is part of this project, either the Route One piece or the Norton Road, should utilize stream StreamSmart principles. StreamSmart crossings allow streams to act naturally so that roads do not wash out during heavy storms. They also add these properly sized culverts and bridges also provide adequate habitat for species to move through them, whether it's fish or other types of mammals and whatnot. Not. So Maine Audubon is hosting a workshop on StreamSmart later this month in October, 28th at Gillsland Farm. So those who aren't familiar with StreamSmart practices, we would encourage you to participate and attend. Falmouth also has an opportunity to have a positive impact on a state endangered species. I don't know if that was really clarified this evening, but it was definitely in the documents. The variable sedge faces threats from habitat conversion fragmentation and degradation so a key component this project moving forward will be minimize the minimizing the impacts to the species providing ample buffers in consideration of providing room for future reproduction the FCC is concerned that as drawn the lot buffers adjacent to the sedge are not sufficient it would and would like to better understand the transplanting techniques as well I think some more information on that from the Applicant would be helpful and then let's see the FCC feels it's crucial that as conversations move forward the planning board and the town think about this project holistically not just how the project aligns with the ordinances but also how it aligns with the comprehensive plan our vision and values and the coastal Bay frontal drainage watershed management plan it would appear as though that there are at this stage that there is some conflict between those and I think those that needs to be Addressed as things move forward for example the comprehensive plan has a natural resource policy section that states we will conserve critical natural areas and expand the protection of environmentally sensitive areas which illustrates that the town sees land use decisions as directly connected to natural resource conservation so those are my comments our comments for now thank you for the opportunity thank you to the presenters and we look forward to working with you and the applicants as This move forward [1:16:46] Chair (Planning Board): Great, thank you. Is there anyone else in the room who would like to speak? Seeing none, I'm going to go back to the online and I do see a hand up there. Go ahead, if you could identify yourself with your name and your address please. Sure, thank you. This is Jason Reikley at [1:17:11] Speaker K (unidentified): H Shady Lane in Falmouth. I walk this property fairly frequently and I appreciate the effort to show the existing trail network and the commitment on the part of the developers to maintain that in the future. I do note however that one of the trails, particularly the one that follows the Tote Road, is not shown on this plan. And so I would just hope that future iterations just sort of map out more thoroughly where the existing trails are on the property. [1:17:46] Chair (Planning Board): Great. Thank you. Is there anyone else online who wishes to speak? Going once, going twice? Okay. OK. Seeing no one else, I'm going to bring it back to the board for lots of lots of conversation. The applicant can correct me if I'm if I misstate. But while there are many things we could focus on, there are two that are probably the highest import to the applicant. And one would be the waiver on the dead-end road length, and the other would be the interpretation of the perimeter, or maybe not the interpretation, but having the road over the perimeter boundary for the RCZO. [1:18:59] Peter Beagle: Yes, you are correct. [1:19:01] Chair (Planning Board): Is that a fair statement of the situation? And everything else for you is small compared to those two questions? Yes, it is. Okay. It doesn't mean we can't ask other questions, but I think one way we could look at this is to say, is there any other information? What other information do we need, or do we need any additional information in order to properly assess those two requests? Dave. [1:19:47] Dave Sinnott: Yeah, I'd also highlight there was other public comment submitted in written form that outlined many detailed items specifically around wetland flood zoning and the endangered species, some of which included, I think, some important additions to map sets in the future, and specifically the Department of Agriculture revisiting the site to do a third party, if you will, on the sedge and question if that had been completed or not. [1:20:17] Peter Beagle: So I did this area down here. We do need some additional work, and staff actually picked up on in my net residential density calculation I deducted for the stream protection area, which I shouldn't have done, but I should have done some of the, you know, the stream and some of the other areas in here. So we'll revamp that, and we will show the where the flood, the little flood area comes up, and the waiting bird habitat. So we the next step reiteration, that will all be, that will all be corrected as far as the sedge. I mean, generally when I initially talked to the folks at Natural Areas Program, you know, they were looking for us to give them the information, but they weren't necessarily coming out to do anything. They were wanting us to do it and talk with them. I haven't given them any information. Lauren Stockwell went out. She did her report, and we have that, but I have not followed up or done anything else with them. But the sedges, I mean, it's kind of a funny thing. I mean, it goes where, like I said before, where, you know, you have an opening, it's got the right conditions, and it kind of migrates around. Like we were a little surprised at some of the changes from the last time that they were out there to what they found now. And then you find that there's, you know, a little bit right along the Tote Road. It's like one of the most traveled, trampled on areas. So, anyway, we can, you know, we're glad to do more. Lauren Stockwell's, you know, she loves talking about this stuff and getting into it. And it's no problem, you know, answering any questions and no problem talking with the Natural Areas Program people with, you know, with information about how that may work, how we can grow those other areas or, you know, appropriate protections. So with, yeah, we can, yeah, I think [1:22:23] Dave Sinnott: specifically the information I'd be looking for, it really is the Conservation Commission's statements around, you know, what amount of area is reasonable to not just protect what's there but to allow for growth. You know, you even mentioned it shifts pretty frequently and quickly where it pops up in some surprising places. How do we allow the space for it to pop up? So like what's a reasonable distance that you should stay away from a known area to ensure that can be properly protected? I'm not an expert in that particular item, so I'd, I'd be hoping we have some other review. Yeah, and in, and in line [1:23:00] Chair (Planning Board): With that, assuming the other matters resolve themselves, I'm really concerned about those lots butting up against the variable sedge and what it's gonna look so easy to mo and I, you know, I don't know if it's, I don't have the answer. I don't know if it's a fence. I think it's more than a sign that blows over in six [1:23:41] Peter Beagle: months. Yeah, well, it shouldn't, it's not going to be in your property, you know, for one thing. So I say that, so I am, I guess what I'm hoping is that we're going to impact these, the little tiny couple sedge areas that are out in this area, and that we're going to make up for that with what we protect or what we can add to these other larger areas. So nobody's going to be near this one, nobody's going to be near this one, so you have this one here, and I think, you know, so there should be, there should be an easy way for us to make sure that 's not in someone's lot, that it is, you know, it delineated, that it's, and maybe there's a buffer between it and the lot [1:24:27] Chair (Planning Board): line. Maybe those are smaller lots or they're shaped a little differently, but and then I guess. Yes. Yeah. Just to clear about whether transplanting of the small variable sedge, whether that's more appropriate than this idea of making more conducive areas. I don't know botanically which is more appropriate. [1:24:58] Peter Beagle: I don't know the answer to that either, but we'll find out. [1:25:01] Chair (Planning Board): I have a concern on this subject of dead ends and roadways and crossing Norton Brook without having a little bit more of a sense of what conceptually can happen in the commercial portion of this land and whether whatever happens there, either for your tenant. I don't have a good sense of what could go there and how much of a road in that's going to have to be provided anyway to this future commercial development. And without that, I am not sure I can reasonably assess whether, you know, if you've built all the way up to Norton Brook a roadway for that commercial development, you can do something that's incredibly conducive to aquatic life and everything else to get over Norton Brook. [1:26:29] Peter Beagle: Yeah, right. So you're worried that we do all this to not impact Norton Brook, and then we turn around and something happens out there and it blows that all away. [1:26:38] Chair (Planning Board): Yeah, the future, the commercial development sort of requires that you do. [1:26:43] Peter Beagle: I'm trying to back up here. Can you help me back up one screen even? The area in the front along Route One is pretty limited because of the stream, the wetlands. How about one more? Actually, so this red line in here is more of the area that's developable. By the time you have your Route One setback, you've got wetlands, little stream, you've got Norton Brook and the setback. The green line that's going through here is stream protection area, so you know you're not getting in that, and you've got this ravine and a little stream segment here, so you're really kind of boxed into this area. So the road that we show coming in, I think, is probably where, if we did, if you said you don't need to cross Norton Brook, one entrance is fine, 10 years from now or whenever this little piece gets developed, I think, I think what you're dealing with is something in this area, and the entrance would be where we're showing it, right across from this other drive. So I think you're, you're talking about a little something there, and like I said, obviously that green line is the stream protection, so you're not going down past that, but that's, that's the area that we're, I think, that you would be looking at for Route 1 development. [1:28:32] Eli Markham: Any? Yes, Eli. If we were to grant the waiver on the access roads, what would replace the road running through the development there? Would you expand the lots there and leave it for conservation? On the right side there, I had the planner, [1:28:50] Peter Beagle: but you know what I'm talking about, I think. Yeah, can I get back to that last screen, Ethan, if you would? I'm not quite sure why my clicker is not clicking. Perfect, thank you. That one right there. Yeah, so if that road went away, you know, that's all that's 50 feet wide. This was the duplex area. You know, I'm not quite sure how exactly how we would incorporate that. I don't think that's, you know, room enough for another lot, whether this lot gets a little larger or trail goes through there, or I don't really know, trying to kind of work and balance all that, all those pieces out as we, as we go, but it obviously allows us, we've got 50 extra feet there to do something with, I [1:29:58] Speaker J (unidentified): think. Yes, Karen, you mentioned what else is needed probably to take a decision. I think that traffic report that you mentioned, that has been provided? [1:30:05] Peter Beagle: It wasn't provided to you. I received it. The next time we submit something, we would be submitting traffic information. [1:30:14] Speaker J (unidentified): Because that addresses also your concern about, you know, the commercial development. [1:30:19] Chair (Planning Board): And conceivably, right. What's that activity in? [1:30:23] Peter Beagle: Although our traffic report doesn't, it does not address any commercial. [1:30:27] Chair (Planning Board): I know. It wouldn't address any commercial. Yeah. Did you have a question? [1:30:35] Dave Sinnott: Dave, maybe not a question, but you know, I think in a way that Norton Streamer, you know, asks of us to have some special considerations for its protection. I think in a way that would give reason for a waiver of that road to not have to have the extra crossing and disturbance of it. I don't see how in our ordinance with the split zoning that we can get there, because it's clearly outside of the de minimis, 5% change. And I'm not sure you could argue that it improves public health and safety to not have the road there. But it seems like if we could find a way to have the zoning be conducive to a longer road in this area, I think that the cause of preserving that watershed, I think I would at least find that compelling to have that be where it is. [1:31:31] Peter Beagle: So that would be maybe moving our zone line all the way to RA, utilizing the duplex as an exception, and then we're all a conservation subdivision, and potentially that might. [1:31:50] Dave Sinnott: I'm only one person, but just to say that I think where, you know,, we have minimum requirements for environmental protection for sedges, you know, considerations of steep slopes and Norton Brook being a particular of interest stream, you know, as cited in many places. I'm looking for extra protection, and I think it's only consistent to say that one less crossing of it would be extra protection. Yeah. [1:32:18] Peter Beagle: Now, you did say de minimis change, so you haven't bought on to the argument that we're We're looking at the next section down, which is actually the waiver section and not a de minimis 5%. [1:32:34] Dave Sinnott: Yeah, so in my opinion, it would be saying that the application of the performance standard are not required in the interest of public health, safety, or general welfare. Fair, and I think, you know, we have comments from public safety saying that road is, and even the fact that we have a washed out culvert isn't a great, a great look to say that, you know, one access point is sufficient here. And so, you know, it's hard to balance what in practice I'm saying I'd prefer to have one road there as opposed to the two where it's only a piece of a paper changing with a zone, but it seems to follow the ordinance that way, in my opinion. [1:33:15] Chair (Planning Board): Just to make sure I'm understanding, you're suggesting return the zone line to the original [1:33:23] Dave Sinnott: property line? If it's a resource conservation, then we're allowed to exempt road length. If it's not, then we... [1:33:32] Chair (Planning Board): Which means the whole thing needs to be in there. The whole thing would need to be in there. Which we are not capable of. We can't do that. I just want to make sure. Everybody in the room is capable of that. Can very clear no this would be possibly we can do this okay and then you've been to have the [1:33:43] Dave Sinnott: Duplex would be the board of appeals so you'd be it's not a simple path forward but seems like it might be an appropriate one for this weird lot set up with both environmental and zoning [1:33:57] Peter Beagle: Challenges and you don't think that same waiver section because it talks about performance standards in all subdivisions the fact that the residential plan development is a subdivision also falls into that [1:34:13] Dave Sinnott: Category the in the resource conservation is specifically to preserve and to work with the natural topography which I think fits with what you're proposing to use the 713 see you would have to show that it's actually in the public's interest for health and safety and welfare to make that change, which I think is a different burden of proof there in [1:34:40] Peter Kenlon: One person. And I don't think that's a performance standard anyhow. I think that's a dimensional requirement. Another good point. What [1:34:55] Chair (Planning Board): If the road were entirely an RA? [1:35:10] Dave Sinnott: And so there's lots accessed off of a different zone. [1:35:19] Eli Markham: It's creative. Okay. I don't dislike it. [1:35:26] Chair (Planning Board): I, there's all sorts of flexibility about the lot sizes in the RCZO, and if that central roadway were completely within the RCZO, you [1:35:48] Eli Markham: Would lose some of the lots. It is, isn't it? I'm sorry? Wouldn't you lose some of the lots at the bottom of the map there? [1:35:52] Dave Sinnott: You might. It's in the buffer of the other. [1:35:55] Chair (Planning Board): Yeah, you might lose, but I don't know. I'm throwing it out there. [1:36:01] Peter Beagle: So if the road was totally in the RCZO, right, so then we wouldn't have our spur road that kind of goes down into the green with those six lots would be, that would go away. Well, would it? I don't know. I wish it wouldn't. If you've got a way to save that. [1:36:25] Chair (Planning Board): Very open? I don't know. I think what I'm advocating, I'm just, I'm suggesting maybe there's another way to skin this cat. I, 'm not on the fly going to be able to figure that out, but that's, you know, maybe if you relook at the size of those RCZO lots and how things are configured, maybe you've, I don't know. Yeah. So, well, so you can get down to 50 [1:36:53] Peter Beagle: Feet right, 50 foot width, RCZO, they're at 85, so you have 35, there's 35 additional feet there. But like I said before, that really kind of restricts the architecture of whatever you're, you know, putting on that, and you end up with the typically the big garage and a little bit of living space in the front, and you know, it's not quite the look that, yeah. But those are your choice. Yeah, right. I know, that's our problem. Yeah. Yes. [1:37:29] Chair (Planning Board): Other thoughts, comments, questions? It doesn't have to be specifically about this. I had a couple of small things I'm just going to throw out. One is, the RPD requires recreational space, I believe, on top of open space, so eventually in whatever future plans that would need to be clarified also. As we think about all the open spaces, are you anticipating the HOA being responsible or having conversations with the land trust? Well, [1:38:11] Peter Beagle: we've already had conversations with the land trust so we're yeah we're not okay we're thinking that 's a better option than homeowners association [1:38:19] Chair (Planning Board): And the homeowners association, good, great answer. And we talked about the flood zone. I'm trying to think if there was anything else that, the other thing, we don't have to resolve this, is whether the board would, we might want to consider a sidewalk under those circumstances if, yeah, I was going to ask, some of us are might be more familiar than others with the property, depending on whether you use those trails or not, so we should probably just sort of make sure we address that. Jamie, did you have another question or thought you wanted to share? [1:39:06] Bruce Hillfrank: I was just, I mean, that's pretty unique, putting the road in the buffer. I guess I never would have thought of that, but with the two zones and trying to keep the neighborhood looking consistent, with not one standard on one side, one standard on the other, it kind of makes sense so they don't have a awkward buffer. Part of me says to mitigate that, maybe the set, the rear setback is also a no-cut buffer on those house lots in the, you know, on the right side of the road, you know, and it kind of was in my Mind, I was thinking that, and then you were talking about protecting the wildlife, the habitat, and I said, well, you could just say the rear setback is a no-cut buffer. You know, I was thinking like it would keep the ownership of the acreage in the lot with the property for, you know, a developable area. What, you know, if they wanted to build XYZ house and such, and marketing-wise, it's, it's, it's buildable air, not buildable area. It's not buildable area either way, but it just wouldn't be able to be cut and kind of like keeping that keeps the neighborhood looking the same on both sides of the road as this is the avenue they want to go, but you know, that might be a reasonable way to add to the rear end of the protection to the wetland or the environmental concerns other [1:40:39] Chair (Planning Board): Other Bruce, Peter thoughts? I'm going to propose, and I don't know how the applicant's going to feel about this, that we tabled this. And I feel like unless people are feeling we can discuss a waiver. [1:41:11] Peter Kenlon: Well, they're here on sketch anyway. Yeah, we don't have to. Right. So we're not doing anything. [1:41:15] Chair (Planning Board): Anything, well, but isn't there a time, don't we start a time clock to the next stage if we sort of go forward and that tabling keeps us out of a, yeah, the time clock is between [1:41:38] Ethan (roll call clerk): Preliminary and final, there's a six month turnaround time, but there's no, not between [1:41:43] Peter Beagle: between sketch okay so I guess when we leave here tonight we're hoping to have a little guidance on sounds like our road in the buffer works I guess I've seen or heard hemming and hawing and some maybe or okay but I haven't heard anybody say that's a problem so we thinking that 's I mean that's one of the big things that we've been right dealing with for the last number of months trying to figure out what this out and then we come back to talk more about the road let's take one at a [1:42:28] Chair (Planning Board): Time, I just give everybody a moment to think about the question of just the buffer, the [1:42:38] Bruce Hillfrank: RCZO buffer and having the road in the buffer to answer these questions. Do you think the people think they need the sidewalk first? That's a good question. Yeah, or can they look at it based off the what we have in front of us? I think maybe [1:42:54] Dave Sinnott: there's two questions one is this the right place to put a road and the other is are you allowed to put a road in the buffer and maybe if we separate those I think we can give the answer I think a road in a buffer is a pretty creative solution I think is that the right place to put a road a sidewalk might be nice to see that before we say yeah that makes sense from a topography standpoint that fit where you're going jamie yeah [1:43:20] Bruce Hillfrank: I guess, you know, I'm looking at the contours and such, and it's, it's a pretty flat area, so I do agree with that. You know, there was no mountain to go around or, you know, you know, so it's kind of a plateau, if you will, which makes it developable because it's not underwater. So I understand the straight line there, but I think the site walk might help people as well. The applicant can more clearly articulate their research and interpretations, and it may guide the group to a decision that unless everyone here things they could make one. Yeah, I would as well. Yeah. [1:44:08] Eli Markham: I think I also do appreciate the solution, though. It's very creative, and I hope we can, well, hope it looks good so we can approve it if that's mandated. [1:44:18] Dave Sinnott: Unless we change the zoning to allow the dead end being longer, which would be, you know, then you wouldn't have to worry about it. [1:44:24] Chair (Planning Board): Or you move the road into its own zone. [1:44:26] Dave Sinnott: I think there's other potentials that may be even better than what you're proposing, but, yeah. [1:44:33] Chair (Planning Board): Yeah, look at those lots. I'm not sure there's not a better way. [1:44:36] Peter Kenlon: Just not sure what it is. And Peter, the only reason there's a buffer in there is because of this artificial condition that's created by having the zoning boundary here, and the ordinance is what it is, but I mean, it's not, whatever I say is going to end up being circular about this, but you know, it's one development we can see that, except we also have to treat it as two, and that's why the road's in the buffer. Yes. [1:45:17] Chair (Planning Board): okay so i 'm not hearing any big strong worries about the roadway in the in the buffer in the perimeter buffer from anyone, but I'm also hearing that we need a sidewalk. [1:45:34] Peter Beagle: Yeah, that's all good. [1:45:38] Chair (Planning Board): And I think the two roadways, the sidewalk is part of that. And the time, I suppose, is also an opportunity. If you make any other changes, maybe there are ways. Maybe some of the staff input will not be so strong. But I will say, personally, it is difficult to ignore pretty unanimous opinion of staff about the roadways. And I completely get the environmental thing, but this is really a balancing of the scales here. [1:46:24] Peter Beagle: Fire, police, I mean, it's everybody that responds to an emergency. I mean, I'd take 10 ways to get in there if I could. So, you know, I don't hold it against them. It's just I'd want that, too. But we just have a little bit of a unique situation here. It sure is. It sure is. [1:46:46] Chair (Planning Board): Aside from these really two big issues and a sidewalk, is there anything else you feel you've had your chance? But you can come to the sidewalk. Is there anything else [1:47:04] Peter Beagle: you would like to know from us? I think we can figure all the other things out, but it's figuring out those two things that we need. That's our priority. Okay. [1:47:22] Chair (Planning Board): Any other questions, thoughts, or comments from members of the board? Jamie? [1:47:28] Bruce Hillfrank: Me? So for the site walk last time, we kind of discussed at the meeting when would make sense to plan it, so they have the notification and we could make sure the most of us could be there, whether it was another planning board night and we [1:47:41] Chair (Planning Board): met an hour early or, but the clocks are gonna change between now and the [1:47:47] Bruce Hillfrank: next one, correct? But so we have to take that into account, but we need the public notice piece, so you know they would have to submit. Thank you. This is asap if they want to get, oh, this would be a re-continuing application, so they'd have to, wouldn't they have to give staff notice to do the public meeting on site, so it would, you know, right, how far advanced notice, two weeks? [1:48:13] Ethan (roll call clerk): Yeah, I mean, we don't, there's nothing in the coordinates that speaks specifically the lead time for site walks, but we've traditionally done like 10 days, which is what the ordinance requires for standard notification to the public otherwise, so that's what we've always tried to shoot for. Today is the 6th. The time changes on [1:48:42] Chair (Planning Board): approximately the third of November. I think we want to do it before the next planning board meeting and before the clocks change, like another Tuesday night. We could try for a Tuesday night. Okay. I think we won. Yeah, do it before that. I don't know if maybe the best thing to do is to send out a poll. The other possibility, we can do it on a weekend. Sorry, but it is. That sometimes, then we're, you know, have more daylight. [1:49:30] Eli Markham: I'm sorry? I would prefer a weekend, I think, for what it's worth. [1:49:33] Chair (Planning Board): Rather than trying to squeeze it in between 5 and 6.30? Or 5.30 and 6.00? Saturday morning. Okay. Okay. I think the best thing to do is we'll just send some options around by e-mail in consultation. [1:49:53] Peter Beagle: Yeah. What do you need from us? We need to know where the road is going, obviously. [1:50:01] Bruce Hillfrank: I was thinking if it started with you showed the utilities right next to the pump station, and we could walk us in where you're proposing the road, and then kind of take— I would follow that straight-line road. It's been the most helpful for me in the past. [1:50:16] Chair (Planning Board): And roughly the road off of Route 1 is sort of the path of the old Tote Road, right? [1:50:23] Peter Beagle: Yeah, but you don't really see that until you get on the development side of Norton Brook. That's really kind of where you pick up that Tote Road. It's very brushy. It's not conducive to walking into Norton Brook from the Route 1 side. So, if you want to get a look at the Route 1 side, you know, the best bet is to leave your car parked down at the pump station area, walk up Northbrook Drive, and then walk down Route 1 to that area. But, like Jamie said, actually the best place to go in, I think, is right there at the pump station. [1:50:55] Chair (Planning Board): Where that pump station is. [1:50:57] Bruce Hillfrank: Yeah, could you have like a poster of this plan or whether whatever modifications you're proposing so you can kind of like talk us in the in the public that's there through yeah just the visual so people can see this is where we are now yeah it's been really helpful in the past yeah and I [1:51:15] Chair (Planning Board): think going in and if you can get us up into that flat area and then yeah kind of go through there [1:51:25] Dave Sinnott: Yeah, the areas of major fill in those ravines and then especially the sedge they plan on transplanting would be good to stop by and then the one that's close to those lots I'd be interested to see just kind of the nature of what does that look like what is the habitat of those sedges yep any [1:51:49] Chair (Planning Board): other thoughts about that okay I think I had one more question but for the life of me can't have been too important because I don't remember so if you don't have any other questions for us [1:52:09] Peter Beagle: No, I think we're good. [1:52:10] Chair (Planning Board): Okay, great, thank you, thank you very much, very much. We have no other business on the agenda, so do I hear a motion to [Ethan (roll call clerk): adjourn? So moved.] Thank you, Dave. Second, Jamie. Thank you. All those in favor. We're unanimous. Thank you all for coming tonight.