News

‘That’s Unfortunate’: P&Z Implores Valley Road Hospital, Neighbor To End Land Use Dispute

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Though two major sides in a land use and legal battle dating back two-plus years have worked hard to reach an agreement, a neighbor whose home directly abuts the Valley Road property at the center of the dispute—who also sits on the Planning & Zoning Commission—appears not to be satisfied, following comments made at a public meeting this week. It’s been three years since Silver Hill Hospital purchased the 1998-built Colonial at 225 Valley Road for $2.5 million, tax records show. Months later, the psychiatric hospital applied to P&Z for site plan and special permit approval in order to renovate and use it as a residential medical treatment facility. P&Z in November 2013 denied the application by a 6-3 vote. Three weeks later, the hospital filed a lawsuit claiming P&Z acted “arbitrarily” and “illegally” in doing so.

Business

‘It Looks Like It Could Be a Dumpster’: Planning Officials Object to Pine Street Restaurant’s Outdoor Seating ‘Bunker’

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Calling a Pine Street restaurant’s makeshift outdoor seating area a ‘bunker’ that could be mistaken for a dumpster, planning officials on Tuesday night called for the eatery to build what was approved or forego the seasonal addition altogether. South End had been approved for an “open, very light and airy” enclosure that extends into would-be parking spaces for temporary outdoor seating, with features that include vertically defined posts, Planning & Zoning Commission member Kent Turner said at the group’s regular monthly meeting. “As you can see, it was very open,” Turner said of the original and approved plans at the meeting, held in the Sturgess Room at the New Canaan Nature Center. “The as-built condition looks like a mechanical equipment louver that completely encloses the space. The fact that it is painted white and the original lower portion of the fence or screen is dark gray is very puzzling, and it appears to be an enclosed structure and I just don’t see how this was even close to what was originally proposed, nor should it be allowed, based on our zoning guidelines and what you see throughout New Canaan as far as outdoor seating.”

Chairman John Goodwin said P&Z had extended an invitation to South End to attend the meeting and speak on the matter, though no representatives from the restaurant were in attendance.

Business

‘A Village Feel’: P&Z Approves Site Plan for Pine Street Market

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With its curbside plaza finished in brick paving, its open-air space and a flexible parking plan that’s designed to allow for additional outdoor seating, as needed, the artisanal foods marketplace planned for 75 Pine St. is expected to transform the street’s “auto-centric” feel into something more pedestrian-friendly, the project’s architects say. According to L. Wesley Stout, principal at New Canaan’s Wesley Stout Associates, a landscape architecture firm, an eating option of some kind drives retail business today—coffee, prepared and take-out foods, “dine-ins”—a differentiator for retailers competing against Internet shopping. “What is remaking ‘Main Streets’ is food,” Stout said Tuesday during a public hearing before the Planning & Zoning Commission. “So places like this will be a huge success, to bring people into these places rather than just maybe stopping into your shop if you’re lucky,” Stout said during the hearing, held in the Sturgess Room at the New Canaan Nature Center.

Business

P&Z Approves Weed Street Subdivision, Mixed-Use Building on Cross Street

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Town planning officials on Tuesday approved a pair of closely followed land use applications—one for a 2-lot subdivision on Weed Street that includes a conservation easement connecting two New Canaan Land Trust properties, and another for a mixed residential-and-commercial structure on Cross Street that’s designed to accommodate future New Canaan Post Office needs. What follows is a summary of each item. Both were approved by the Planning & Zoning Commission at the group’s regular meeting, held in the Sturgess Room at the New Canaan Nature Center. Weed Street
P&Z on six conditions (see below) approved the 2-lot subdivision at 929 Weed St., a 9-acre property whose current structure—a Midcentury Modern—will remain, while two additional lots will be carved out. As part of the subdivision, the property’s owner is granting as a conservation easement along an approximately 425-foot strip of land that connects two parcels long ago given to the New Canaan Land Trust: One that backs up (eastward) into the woods and connects eventually to the New Canaan Nature Center, and another that includes wetlands and fronts Weed Street itself.

Business

Cross and Vitti Streets: ‘Ripe for Change’

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Calling the area of Cross and Vitti Streets a largely neglected section of downtown New Canaan that has potential to serve the community better, officials on Tuesday sketched out a plan to re-imagine its use, density and streetscape, possibly even introducing a newly defined business zone. As it is now, most of the businesses on either side of Cross and Vitti are part of “Business Zone B”—a designation that allows for heavier-duty commercial use such as for garden supplies, hardware and lumber. But the way the area has developed—in some ways, as a kind of industrial park within New Canaan, with repair shops, car washes and print businesses—may not be just how it would be mapped out given a choice now, Town Planner Steve Kleppin said at a subcommittee meeting of the Planning & Zoning Commission. “It’s ripe for change,” Kleppin said during the meeting, held in the Sturgess Room of the New Canaan Nature Center. “It’s the one area that I don’t know if there is anything that couldn’t change over there at some point in time, and there’s already talk of some new development over there, so I think it’s a good idea for us to be out front and really decide how do we want this area to look in the future, what’s the potential of it.”

Kleppin said he has money in the budget now to bring in a planning/design consultant to sketch out some designs and then oversee a series of public meetings and workshops for feedback from residents.