Speaker 1: All right folks. We're gonna call immediate order for the Yeah. Zoning Board of Appeals here in Natick tonight. I know you were expecting Dave Jacobowitzs to be your chair, but he's otherwise occupied. So he is asked me to step in for tonight, so please bear with me and provide some patience and I'll give everybody else patience too as I sit in the chair, his little intro speech. I know at the beginning he likes to say that we are all Natick residents and we are here and we'd like to treat everyone with respect and professionalism and we appreciate that from you. And we'll give the same back to everybody.
So let's be polite and and courteous while we're speaking. And all conversations should go through the chair unless I allow you to talk directly to the applicants from time to time. And everybody should get a chance to speak. We'll ask you to come to the podium, introduce yourself and give your name and address for the minutes if you wanna make any comments on any, anything you hear tonight. We also have a time, let's see, I think he's got a speech right here from the Speaker 2: Top of Speaker 1: The agenda, top of the agenda, which is here. We have a public speak session at the beginning of each meeting where any individual,
any individual may raise an issue that is not included on the agenda and will be taken under advisement by the board. There will be no opportunity for debate during this portion of the meeting. This section of the agenda is limited to 15 minutes and any individual addressing the board during this section of the agenda shall be limited to 15 minutes. Is there anyone that would like to speak on any topic that is not on the agenda for tonight? Say none. We'll get right to it. And the first hearing we have is, has been continued from our March meeting. It was for 47 High Street. We've got a request from the applicant for a continuance
for the ZBA meeting for 47 High Street. We'd like to be on the next meeting in May. So I don't think there's anybody here from the applicant that wants to speak. Is there a motion? Is there? Yes. Speaker 3: Hi, good evening. Is this on? Speaker 1: I can hear you fine. Yep. Speaker 3: My name is John Zko, Z-I-C-K-O, a personal rep for Robert w Zko. Date of death July 2nd, 2019. I did see it on the agenda. This is the first that I had heard of a continuance until May. So do, do, do we know who requested that continuance? Speaker 1: It would be the applicant or the representative. Yes. Yep. Speaker 4: I received an email late this afternoon
Speaker 3: From May I, may I ask Mr. Chair? Oh, sure, Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I, I've got an email here from an Alan Marks president of Realty Executive Boston West. Speaker 3: Okay, thank you. Sure. So we will be continued until, and that meeting would be when? In May Speaker 1: Peg, what's the date number? May 19th. Speaker 3: May 19th. May 19th. Speaker 1: If we choose to approve a continuance, it would probably be to May 19th. Yeah, I would, Speaker 3: I would respectfully request that you do. Okay, thank you. Sure. Speaker 1: Is there a motion Speaker 3: Move to continue? May 19th. Speaker 1: Thank you. Rob. Jeff, C 25 Speaker 5: Dash four.
Speaker 1: Thank you Rob. Rob seconded. All in favor of continuing. Thank you. So there won't be any more public notices for that. This is the public notice that it will be held on May 19th. Alright, number two on the agenda. We've got a public hearing for eight Liberty Street. We have an application by eight Liberty Street LLC for a finding under Mass General Law 40 a section six, and the native zoning bylaw section four B and five a applicant proposes to raise the existing single family dwelling and construct a new single family dwelling on the preexisting non-conforming lot as shown on the plan submitted. Okay,
Speaker 5: Good evening. Speaker 3: Good evening. Speaker 5: Attorney Vin O'Brien representing the applicant. As you mentioned, this is a preexisting lot. It's a relatively good sized lot, but it's under the required size. The required size is 20,000 square feet and this is 16,000 square feet. It's also interesting in that it's front end three sides by street. So the setback for the street is 30 feet versus the typical sideline setback. And we meet all that. So the minimum frontage is, requires 120 feet. We have 203 lot depth would be 1 25 in this zone.
And we have 160. The front yard setback, which I, as I say is on three sides is 30 feet. Currently the existing building is within the frontline setback at 27.9. We're gonna make that conforming in the closest setback from any frontline is 37.1 feet. The only other sideline setback that's applicable is the right side setback, which would be required under the zone for 12 feet. It's currently at 16.2 and we're gonna keep it at 16.2. The property's not within the Water Resource Protection District. It's a relatively flat lot
as you can see the existing grades 1 45, we're keeping the existing grade and we meet the height requirements at 33 feet nine inches. And that's shown on the plan submitted. I think that's everything. Speaker 1: Good, thank you. I had a couple questions looking at this, this afternoon. It, I know it's a funny shape. It's on a corner between Bradford and Liberty, correct? I didn't see a measurement to the side abutting. It's number six. Liberty Street. I would think that would be, because you've got two front yard setbacks. You have two two rear yard setbacks.
Speaker 5: We actually have three front yard setbacks. Three well, because you have Bradford Liberty and Liberty. Okay. So we're keep 'em 30 feet all around and then the, is that number six to the left? Bradford Realty Trust? Yeah. If you look at the front, Connor, it's 16.2 feet in the Requireds 12 and is on the plan towards the front of the, Speaker 1: Okay. This end, I'm just, I'm looking at, what I'm looking at is the side lot line between six and your property and I it's 12 Speaker 6: Feet Speaker 1: And that would, yeah, it would be 12 feet. It looks like it's perfectly conforming. Speaker 5: Yeah, it's required And, and it's shown on the, on the map at 16.2.
Speaker 1: No, I'm looking down the little bit lower or a little bit to the south. The line that takes the side property line back out to Liberty Street between number six and this address here, number eight. Do you see the property separating six and eight? Speaker 5: I'm, I'm not sure what you're talking about. Do you mind if I Yeah, Speaker 1: There's a, this property line separates number six and number eight right Speaker 5: Here. Oh, okay. Yeah, Speaker 1: I would consider that to be a side yard. Right. Speaker 6: And here's a setback, Speaker 1: Right? So what I don't see is a measurement from this side to the structure.
That's what I think is missing. Speaker 6: Okay. I I typically we would show the closest sideline setback, Speaker 1: Right? This, Speaker 6: Which is 16.2 and that's, this exceeds that. Right. Speaker 1: That would be for this sideline. And then you've got, you've got, I consider, I Speaker 6: You consider Speaker 1: It's, it's probably semantics because it looks like it complies anyway. Same sideline, Speaker 6: It's just at an angle. So we consider it in the same sideline. Well Speaker 1: It's, it's separating two separate parcels. This is to number six and that's to a different property. If, if, if Speaker 6: The board would prefer it, we can, you know, Speaker 1: I'm just trying to be consistent then. Speaker 6: I mean if it needs to be on the plan, I can ask an extension or make a
Speaker 1: Approval. It might just be a, a minor submittal revision. Okay. If we choose to approve it tonight. I what you meant. Sorry, I I don't think that would hold up a, an approval or, or anything tonight. But the other one might be a little more Speaker 5: Problematic. Okay. Speaker 1: Problematic. How did you calculate the, the new building height? 'cause we've got particular requirements under the natick zoning law for a corner lot. Speaker 5: Oh, okay. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 5: I'd have to ask the engineer that question. Of course. This evening he's not here. Speaker 1: I'll, I'll, I'll give you a clue. On a corner lot you have to measure the height
of the building based on the elevation at the center line of the two intersecting streets. And I just would like someone to confirm that that is how it was measured Speaker 5: And I can't do that. Okay. So I'll have my, Speaker 1: It might be continuing then tonight. Yeah. Speaker 5: In other words, I, I'd be, I'd be telling you I think it's correct, but I am, I'm not an engineer so I can't clarify that. Speaker 1: And I didn't see anything in the plans to indicate one, one way or the other. I don't think how it was, how it was calculated. You know, a lot of, for for, for your normal lot it would be, you know, the average, average thing around the perimeter of the building.
But on corner lots we have a separate definition for building height that applies to these corner lots. Speaker 5: In that instance, I, I, I could try to do a calculation, but I'm not an engineer so I can't certify it, so I'd request an extension. Speaker 1: No, we just want to make sure that we get the right height and Right. Give you the right relief that you're requesting. Speaker 5: So if that's okay, I'd ask for an extension to the next meeting. Speaker 1: Well, let's, Speaker 5: Let's go, let's see what they Speaker 1: Room and see if there's any other concerns for many board members. Speaker 7: I'm looking at the height on the front elevation. It says 33 9 it looks like from the grade, not 30 from the street, just for what it's worth.
Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 7: Yep. And the average grade is 1 45 5 on that calculation? Correct. And I'm, if I see where the, the road looks like there's some one 40 twos in there. Speaker 5: Yeah. On one of the road. Right. You're Speaker 7: Probably cut close, Speaker 5: That's why I'm not gonna certify it. No, I, Speaker 7: I think you're doing the right thing here. Speaker 1: Any other questions from the board? Anyone in the audience wanted to speak to this one? Please come on up. Speaker 8: Yes, good evening. My name is Barbara Irby, IRBY six Liberty Street Abut,
I have not seen any of these plans. I did look at what was sent to us on here, but there was nothing. So we've never seen any of this. Is there a resource where we can look at this in a timely fashion? Because I have no idea what it's gonna look like. Speaker 1: It, I believe it's all available to the public online Peg might give you the website or Speaker 8: We looked at, we got this, I looked at this several times, including this afternoon and there was nothing on there. Just basically showed basically the, you know, approvals for certain things, but not the way it looked. So Speaker 1: It might be a link that you had to click on for a zoning board permit
and that would take you to the documents that were submitted. I Speaker 8: Didn't see it. I dunno if any of our other neighbor saw to the zoning board saw that. But anyway, we would like to see, I know you were talking again about sidelines. I know that our, our property on the sixth Liberty side to the eight liberty, the way, the way it comes down, it doesn't come straight down from the Bradford Street side. It goes Bradford roadside. It goes a little this way. So I wanna make sure everything is, is lined up appropriately. Again, since I haven't seen it, I don't know which way it's gonna be. Someone told me an engineer that was by that it was the, the house is gonna face the other direction.
Could you describe that at least so we can know what it looks like? Speaker 1: Well, according to these plans, they're kind of squaring it to the rear lot line on Bradford. Speaker 8: Okay. So where's, where's like the front door of this Speaker 1: Structure Can come take a look at the plans if you want. Okay. Speaker 8: Again, I Speaker 5: Don't, and I'd also be happy if it's, I know you have a busy agenda tonight. I, if she gives me her email I can send it to her. Yeah, I'll copy of the plans if you want. Yeah, so this is the front of the house here and this is pro proposed driveway. So like Speaker 8: This is us. Yeah, so Speaker 5: See it's kind of long here. We can square it up. I'm Speaker 8: Gonna square it off there. Yeah. Okay. So I Speaker 5: Didn't more in the Senate of the lot.
Speaker 8: Okay. Yeah, I'd like to see that. Yes, Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 8: And I had a couple, several other questions but I don't know if someone else would like to speak first. Speaker 1: That's fine. And I think we're probably gonna continue this to May, so you all will get another chance to take a look at the plans they may or may not change between now and then, depending on the building height. But you'll have an opportunity to look at the website and see the plans that are there or Speaker 5: I'd be happy to email Speaker 1: It or email them. Yeah. Speaker 8: Okay. Again, the rest of these are more sort of specific specifics about when, when the construction starts and how, you know, the noise and, and timeframe and all that stuff.
'cause again, we're, we live right next door, so if I, if it's gonna be continued then I'm happy to look at the information and then come back with more questions. Great. Great. Speaker 1: Okay, thanks. Speaker 8: Great, thank you very much. Speaker 1: Anyone else wanted to please? Speaker 9: No. Hello, my name is Jim Cody from 14 Bradford Road. My concern is that there's currently a, a fence put up around the perimeter of the property with netting, so to speak around it. So when you're coming down to Bradford Road, you have to go into the intersection because you can't see to the right at all. So you almost have to go halfway into the intersection
to turn left to go down Liberty Street. So my request would be that the builder remove that netting, not the fence, just the netting. So you can see through and see cars coming down. Liberty towards Bradford Speaker 5: Doesn't sound like a problem to me. Speaker 1: Can we, can we ask the owner or? Yeah, if you're the guy Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm the guy. I, I, I I'll talk to you about that but I, okay. I don't see that as an issue. Okay, Speaker 9: Great. Thanks. Thank Speaker 5: You. It doesn't sound very attractive anyways. Speaker 2: It's not. No. Speaker 1: Even more so. Might be dangerous. Speaker 5: It might be. Yeah. Speaker 1: Anyone else wanted to speak
before we get back here on May? In May. Speaker 10: Bill Blues name 39 Bradford Road. You need it? My question is, what time in the morning do they start construction? Speaker 1: I seven Speaker 11: 30. Speaker 1: Yeah, we've got a by we have zoning bylaws on that point, right? 7:00 AM Speaker 11: 7:00 AM Speaker 1: Not before seven. Monday through Speaker 4: Friday at 7:00 AM on Saturday. It's eight. Speaker 11: Yeah. Speaker 10: You can't make it any later during the week? No. Okay. The time by us. Alright. Thank you. Speaker 11: And peg it just a full information for him. It is 7:00 PM that Speaker 7: They stop that they can stop.
Yeah. So you guys aware of that? 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM that they, seven to seven. Speaker 5: Good news, bad news. They get done quicker if they lo work longer days. So it's Speaker 1: Come on up. Speaker 7: Sorry, Speaker 12: Margie Bluestein 39 Bradford Road. I just wanna know where is the front door? 'cause we, we live right across the street. Is it on Liberty Street the way it is now? Where is it gonna be? On Bradford Road. Speaker 7: Really? Yes sir. Can you show her again where the front door is? I Speaker 1: Wanna take a look at the plans here. Yeah,
Speaker 5: Yeah. I don't have the full set with me, but I'll send them to you. Oh, okay. Okay. Speaker 12: Thank you. Speaker 5: You're welcome. It's a long Bradford. When we're done I'll get your email address along with Speaker 7: Okay. Thank you Speaker 5: Clark. I have a full set of architectural plans I can send them from the elevations. Sure, Speaker 1: Yeah. It looks like for folks who are listening in Bradford Road will have the front door and the driveway will actually still be off Liberty Street, I think. I think it's there currently. It's almost in the same spot with the driveway, but the front door will be off. Brad Bradford, apparently. Anyone else in the audience wanted to? Yes ma'am. Speaker 7: Barbara Speaker 8: Six Liberty Street again.
And in terms of the netting, again, we live on the other side. The, i I know part of the issue is that sometimes the, the fence, it seems like people move it, but you can't, you have to have a, a clear, the sidewalk is not always clear and when you try to come around the corner, a car would come and they, they won't even see you because of the netting. So I'm not real excited about seeing all the construction on that side, but I think it'd be better for site for everyone. 'cause we back out of our driveway and you can't see around the corner to to Liberty Street and Bradford. So maybe they could take the, the fence, the,
the green cover off of it so we could see around the corner. Speaker 1: Think that's Speaker 5: What we, the net. Yeah. Okay. It sound like a tennis court netting kind of thing. Speaker 8: It it's basically, it's, it's like chain link fence, but then it's got green netting that's tied all around like tennis netting blocks things, which is great but we can't see. So it's, I don't want a car coming around and injuring anyone either from Speaker 5: That's Speaker 7: Right. Speaker 11: Typically the builder will will do it actually as a nod to the neighbors to sort of absolutely clean it up. But in this case it's working against you guys. Yep. Yep. Speaker 1: I think you could pull it back 10 feet or whatever.
Speaker 5: Yeah. I mean the netting sounds unattractive personally. Right, right. So yeah. Speaker 1: But we wanna make sure they can pull out their driveway safely. Exactly. At least and navigate the sidewalks. Okay, I agree. Seeing none, I think we would entertain a motion to continue this one. Speaker 7: Motion to continue turn a Z. Yep. Speaker 1: All right. All those in favor of continuing to the May 19th date. Who's, Speaker 11: Are you out or as the chair or should we go all five? Do you wanna do all Speaker 1: Five for sitting on this one? I don't, I Speaker 11: Doesn't matter. Speaker 1: I dunno if we wanna assign people
yet since we're all here, depending on who shows up next month. Oh, okay. It could be those five if, if one of us dropped out. Yep. Yeah. Okay. Any five can vote to continue since we're not taking a, I think a material vote on the substance of the Speaker 2: Got Speaker 1: It. Of the thing. So, well let's go this way. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, all those in favor? Great. So we'll continue that to May 19 and you'll all have a chance to look at the plans, hopefully speak to the developer about the fence and come back again next month with any questions. Great, Speaker 5: Thank you. Anybody wants to give me their email? I'll just be Speaker 2: Right off here.
Thank you. Speaker 1: Alright, next on our agenda we're going to hear 16 Westfield Road, an application for Hanken Refining of Master Law 48 section six and the native ex zoning bylaws. The applicant proposes to raise the existing single family dwelling and construct a new single family dwelling on the preexisting non-conforming lot as shown on the plans. Who would we have for the applicant? Speaker 13: Caroline Vianna. Speaker 1: Okay, good Speaker 13: Evening. V-I-A-N-A-A. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 13: So I'm here to represent Hank Aian today and we have, we starting with the 79, right?
Yes. 79 New Street. Speaker 2: 16 Westfield. Speaker 13: Oh, 16. Okay, so 16 Westfield. We have two floors and a half and we have about 47 square feet of gross floor area and 22, about 2246 of lot coverage. I have the proposed and required in a little bit as well. We carefully designed based on the neighborhood, we looked on every single detail the Bo hangs and the siding and we'll take everything in
consideration in colors if you guys have any comments as well. Let me just go back to the discipline for 16. So for the 16 Westfield world we have the non-conforming lot. We have required 15,000 square feet and we have the existing at 11 6 4 7 square feet. We comply with all the front set and front side and back setbacks and everything else. It's based on our bylaws, the lot coverage. The building height is be below 35
and the total gross growth floor area is 47 26. On the living area for the building, this will be in a crawl space. We'll have no basement. And you can see we have the draft for the side plan here on the right on the left side we have the proposed finish floor, grade 1 63 0.3 and the roof peak at 1 95. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 1: And although this looks like a corner lot, it's not,
it's all on one street, although it's wrapped around your property. Speaker 13: Yes. Speaker 1: Okay. Alright. I didn't have any questions about this one. Anyone on the board had any thoughts about this project? Speaker 7: Do you have a better zoning chart? It's kind of messed up. Speaker 1: It looks to me like the only non-conformance is for lot area, Speaker 13: Correct? Speaker 7: I think 35. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 1: And they're bringing it up almost to the maximum height of 34.8? Yeah, still under the 35. Speaker 14: And are they near maximum coverage area?
Yeah, it looks to be according to this drawing. Speaker 1: Oh, 22.46%. Yep. Yep. Under the 25 but Speaker 14: Crowded Speaker 1: Double what it was or is today. Speaker 11: I think I'll reserve comments until I see if there's any neighbors. Sure. Around Speaker 1: We can open it up. Anyone come on up. Speaker 15: Good evening. Good evening. Peg and zoning board members, thank you for the opportunity to speak. My name's Sherry Brass, my family and I live at, in Natick have lived here for over 30 years. More specifically,
our family home is located at 77 Mill Street as a resident of 77 Mill Street. We are abuts of the projects of both 16 Westfield and I know this is, I, I don't know how this works, but also 79 Mill Street, just so you know, they're right next to each other. So 79 next to us. Okay. And then the other one right behind us. So two projects as abuts, I wanted to come before you and raise some of our concerns about the projects. We hope to learn that the board
and the builder will consider steps to mitigate our concerns. Our concerns include number one, asbestos and lead paint. As with most houses built in the 1950s and the 1960s, asbestos and lead paint were commonly used, but we are now aware of related health concerns with those materials during the demolition. Dust and debris of these materials often become airborne. We would like to ask that the builder inform the neighborhood as to
safety steps to be taken to protect the neighborhood of these airborne toxins. Can Speaker 1: I, can I address that one right off the bat if I could? Sure. The, the method of construction and the, the materials of that demolition project would be regulated by our board of health here. It wouldn't really be under the zoning board of Appeals authority to condition that or regulate that. So we can't really consider that or,
or help you with your concerns on that point. Okay. We would invite you to work with the Board of Health if you had questions about the method of demolition and, and how that's going to take place. Speaker 15: Okay. Thank Speaker 1: You. I want to, I want to give you what we can give you and let you know where to go for the things that we can't help you with. Speaker 7: Something worth noting that there are rules and it's Right, yeah, very well dealt with. Yeah, Speaker 1: There's, there's plenty of state and local laws that handle the demolition process and the materials. Yes. So Speaker 15: We're hopeful that those will be followed. Yep. So my next questions were
what steps are gonna be taken about the materials and how will the neighbors be informed? So we'll, we'll we'll go to the next thing. Number two is the noise and debris and debris. And number three is pest insects and rodents. In addition to the safe removal of the materials of the previous homes, would the builder consider installing a permanent fence along our property line that is congruent with other fences for the new builds in the neighborhood? The fence would help keep the noise and debris contained. In addition, maybe like hosing down the property with water.
I guess that doesn't have to do with you all when disturbing the ground for new construction that can often displace insects, rodents and other pests. It is common practice for the, is it common practice for the builder to utilize a reputable pest control company to manage any potential displacement? Speaker 1: On that point, again, we've got a letter from our board of health that they've reviewed these plans and they had some comments and some of those deal with your concerns. I think I have a copy here and it should be online for anybody else to take a look at.
But the board of health regulates these kinds of things and they want, prior to signing off on a demolition application, asbestos inspection report and a pest inspection report must be provided to the Board of health. So they're gonna have to survey the property and tell the board of health whether or not there's any asbestos, whether or not there are any pests on the site, provide the reports to the town and do an abatement if necessary. And that will all be regulated by the board health. Speaker 15: Okay. So should I talk to them about also the pest insect? Speaker 1: Absolutely. Yep. Speaker 15: Okay.
So I can get that information from just call them or call me. Yeah. Okay. I'll call you. Alright, thank you. And then lastly and very importantly, one of our family members living at 77 Mill Street has a serious health condition and we'll continue to undergo treatment and recovery during this entire construction period. So unfortunately for us, the timing is extremely poor. Additionally, everyone in the house has asthma analogies particular to dust
and debris in the air with ongoing construction that exacerbates our asthma allergy issues, which will cause extra stress to an already extremely stressful time. Thus we ask that you consider these suggestions or others that may be suitable to our situation. We so appreciate being able to bring our concerns to you and are open to discussing our suggestions as well as yours. Anything that can be done to mitigate the chaos of the construction sites to at once besides and behind our home would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you for listening and we're hopeful that you can help. Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank Speaker 11: You. And ma'am, your address again was, I'm sorry, just so I'm looking at a map here. Speaker 15: 77 Mill Street. Speaker 11: 77 Mill Street. Okay. Yep. Speaker 15: Thank you. Thanks. Speaker 2: Thank you. Thanks. Speaker 1: Yes sir. Speaker 16: Hi everyone, my name is Gustavo Vera, F-A-V-E-T-T-A. I'm the builder at 79 and 16 West Field. I just, she's already left, but just wanna clarify before we get the permit, we have to go
through the water health and we have to apply for asbestos, test all the, those tests before you get approval, if you have any. Those kind of stuff there. We have to try hiring special company to remove all the stuff. And then about the same thing about the pest control before the Malaysia we have to do before 15 days we have to do the pest control and have a certified and sent to the building department and we gonna do all this stuff and anything the neighbor need to talk to us
to help them during the Speaker 13: Construction. We'd be glad to Speaker 1: Help. That's all good, thank you. Thank you. I would invite you to, you know, leave your name and phone number or email with Peg and she might end up putting you in contact with these abutters so that they'll have ability to communicate with you. Okay. Thank you. Thanks. You wanna know Speaker 17: Or later? Speaker 18: I, I I have it. Speaker 11: Oh, you have it right now. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thanks. Thank you. Speaker 11: Alright, bye. As it, as it relates to the overall massing and size of the house, it's re it's related to the interior as well,
specifically looking at the master bedroom, which is over 500 square feet. Were there, are you guys aware of, of how large these spaces are and, and thought about what the impact is on the massing and sides of the building? Speaker 13: Yes, this is, we've made it like a very detailed research before what cell in Natick and that's basically, if we don't have a big master desi master suite, it's a very downside. And for the, for the design, Speaker 11: I, I would absolutely disagree. Your master suite is like 800
or 900 square feet, including the closet and the bathroom. That's about half the size of, or even two thirds of the size of most houses here. Speaker 13: Yeah. We have this space on top of the garage and we try to make everything from the outside look cohesive with the gables and the roof lines. Yeah, Speaker 11: No, I think the design is interesting from a masking standpoint. It's, you can tell where I'm going. It's, it's far too big of a house for the site. Yep. Speaker 17: Is it 47 26, is that the livable square feet of the house going up from 1378? Speaker 13: Yes. Counting the base, the, the attic space
that's just open area because they have no basement, it's just a crawl space. Speaker 17: Yeah, I think just sort of echoing what Andy said that it does, it pushes about four inches to the absolute maximum height in the lot on a lot. That's also taking up almost the entire coverage that's permitted on the lot. So I think it, it tends to loom over the neighbors around there. It's, it would be I think quite a large factor, probably the largest house in that neighborhood. So it just, it feels like it's, it's quite large for a lot. Speaker 13: Yeah. We also took a look on the eight west field design,
so we kind of look like the same, the same design and the same size. I know it's a little bigger design for our lot where we try to make these houses look as nicer as possible for the area. Speaker 11: The aesthetics are, I mean the detailing looks sort of pleasant, pretty nice. Yeah, it's just huge. Yeah. Do you have that same model and a smaller footprint? Yeah, like 30% smaller Speaker 13: Then I would need to talk to my client because this is all based on selling price. He's a developer and I can't give you the answer right now.
Speaker 11: Yep. Speaker 2: Yeah. Anyone else? I Speaker 7: Don't have anything to add to that. Speaker 2: Okay. No, Speaker 1: I guess we could see no other comments from the abutters or the audience. We could give her a sense of our inclination and give her an opportunity to decide what she wants to do. Right. So I personally, I it is a big house. I think it is big. I, I hesitate sometimes to inject my opinion into that of the neighborhood. And so since I didn't hear any great objection from the
neighbors about the size of the building or the massing or, or anything like any of those concerns, I heard about the fence and she wanted privacy and they were concerned about safety and dust. I, in the absence of abut objection, I might be able to approve this for a finding, but I'd be interested to hear what some of the other members have to say before we put it to a vote. Okay. Speaker 11: Yeah. Highly, highly likely to not approve it. Speaker 2: Same for me. I agree. Speaker 7: I'm generally with Jason, well not generally, sometimes, often I Speaker 1: Should, I we should probably designate
who was gonna vote on this first. Yeah, probably. Let's go from this side again. 1, 2, 3, 4. And Rob, how about that? Speaker 7: But this is, this, this is clearly, you can see the zoning envelope and you touch every corner you possibly can with the rectangle. It's clear you're maximizing, there are a lot of houses. Matter of fact, nearly every single house that gets approved is substantially smaller than this. And presumably they all sell now, you know, I, I understand the, the financial considerations, but this is much larger than the houses in the neighborhood,
but pretty fair margin. Speaker 1: Rob, any thoughts? Speaker 14: Yeah, I'm not a big fan of tipping hands. Speaker 1: I mean, we could put it to a vote and either approve it or deny it. Yeah. Or give her a chance to. Speaker 13: Yeah. It's hard when you, when you have a house, let's say about 3,500, but you have a full basement that the person can later on do whatever they want for storage. But in those houses we cannot have a basement. So the house needs to have like extra closets and extra space for everything. La bigger laundry, they have no space under the house.
That's a kind of a difference we are going through. If you see that space, the livable space we did basically about 500 to 800 square foot is just on the attic to give them this extra ar area to be used because a house that has 3,500 square footage that is smaller than ours would have at least 2000 square footage on basement. That, in that case we are not able to, Speaker 11: I I would consider that if I didn't look at the master bedroom and, and the kitchen and just see so much excess square footage,
it just feels like it hasn't been really considered carefully. Not to say that it needs to be small, not saying that at all, but it does need to be carefully considered. And I think when you see spaces that are that big and literally, you know, sort of off the area. Yeah. Your, your island from the, from the fridge is 10 feet or 11 feet when usually in all kitchens in in town, they're, it's five feet. It, it's, it's just for my estimation, it's just too small of a lot for this big of a house.
So Speaker 1: It sounds like you might not be able to get three outta five votes. Would you like an opportunity to redesign, come back with something smaller that might get your three votes, Speaker 13: But then we need to resubmit again for the next meeting, right? Or could we just come for the next meeting? Right. Speaker 1: We can continue this and, and you can submit revised plans. Give us, you know, a week or so before the next hearing, submit the plans to peg. Give us a chance to look at those. But it sounds to me like this probably would not get the vote.
You need to approve the way it's designed today. So Speaker 19: What are the Speaker 17: Consequences of chair of a no vote right? Is does it have to be held back for how much time? Speaker 1: Yeah. If we deny a permit application like this, it would be barred from Resubmittal for a period of two years unless it was substantially revised. And so that that can set you back quite a bit of Speaker 13: Time. The client here, can I consult him before I I make the decision? Sure. Speaker 2: Hey, Speaker 19: Hi everyone one, thank you for commenting on the plan.
So I'm the builder, one of the builders and I would like to just point out, so in terms of the concerns about the size of the house, so we got our references from recent builds at number eight Greenleaf Road, which is five minute walk from, from our address. And that house is, Speaker 2: Let's see, how big is it? Speaker 19: That house is like 45, 45 40 square feet. And so in terms of the size, we're just making it, it's almost like a standard of the new construction recently built.
Speaker 14: Can I do a Dave Jacobowitzs? Speaker 11: Yeah. Speaker 14: The other, what goes on around other sites in town has no bearing on this particular application. This is its own site, its own construction and we are not really a precedent setting board Speaker 1: That said, I mean it's, it has to be not substantially more detrimental to the neighborhood. So I think it's fair to look at other buildings existing in the neighborhood today and see if Speaker 14: That's fair. Yeah. Which Speaker 1: We did. That's all. Speaker 11: Yep, I did. Yep. I mean this, this neighborhood is,
I know there's a special name for this type of, of Cape Pellum. I'm sorry, what is it? It's a Pellum Cape Pellum. Pellum Pel Cape Pellum, Pellum. I mean, heck, what are those 1300 square feet? The originals that were probably in the area were all built around them in the 1950s. Speaker 19: Yeah. The originals are about like 1500 square feet. Yes, 1500. Speaker 11: Yeah. Yep. Which is yeah, which is what I guess you had here before. So yeah, you're, you're almost three times that. Speaker 14: Why can't you build a basement? I must, I I might have missed it. Speaker 19: Oh, so we actually did a water table level testing soy pits. Okay. We did that with the board of health
and the water table level there is pretty high. So in reality it is not possible to do a full basement there, which is a, it's kind of like a must for newer built homes. Hence why the architect was mentioning that we just needed more room on first and second floor for storage. 'cause usually that's the goal for building a basement. But since in this case we don't have a a it's not possible for us to build a basement. Speaker 14: Got it. Okay. Speaker 19: And, and when we were designing the, these two homes,
we took a look on the neighborhood and we tried to make our design to blend in with the neighborhood, which is why we built two colonials. They are different in, in exterior design, but they are both colonials and also they are similar to the design language of eight Westfield Road, which was built back in 2023 down the road. I think another thing that puts, puts our lots in the, I would say disadvantage is
the beaver dam brook is right around the corner there. So that's why we are already limited in terms of, you know, without a basement. And also this particular design we take into consideration of where to put the driveway, the front door to meet all requirements. Speaker 11: I I I underst we under, I understand all of that and I think it's, it's well presented. Again, what you haven't, I think truly addressed enough is the fact that, again, just doing some of the, the calc here, the, the master suite
is almost 1200 square feet. Speaker 17: There's several hundred square feet of open space Speaker 11: On Speaker 2: In the middle. It could be Speaker 11: Storage space somehow. Hmm. Speaker 19: So these, so the master bedrooms are oversized. We didn't show on the plan, but usually when the house is completed, the homeowners would like to add custom built-ins just for storage. So that's taking into consideration of just storage space Speaker 13: And turn Speaker 2: It. Yeah, Speaker 17: I guess to get on the first floor, there just seems to be, again, quite a bit of open space and I'm looking for storage on the, on the first floor
and I see a walk-in closet in the first bedroom, but beyond in a pantry, but not much else I guess for storage on the first floor. Speaker 19: That is the storage space is, like I said, it's not shown on the current plans right now because we are planning to customize the built-ins based on the, the clients. Yeah. Speaker 13: And we also took into consideration that we had no basement. We created a massive laundry room so then people can store products there and supplies
because there's nowhere else for, for them to store anything in the house, home or Speaker 11: A warehouse. I think part of what some of us are reacting to, and I'll just speak for myself, is that also the, just pulling up the site plan for my own that I think, Jeff, you alluded to it, but you know, touching all, you know, all of the setback envelope and being in this unique situation where you essentially don't have a rear, but at the same time deciding to take all of that up, you know, as far as creating a backyard, not,
not really much of one. I mean I think we, we see this sort of a lot in Needham, you know, Needham, they really push it to all, all setbacks and it creates some houses that, you know, I think there's some nice stylistic moves to it, but they're just so big, you know, there's no yard left, there's no, so it just, it just, yeah, I've said what I said so Speaker 1: That's fair. What do you think? I, I'm thinking, you know, it's, it's a big house and I, I don't want to get into redesigning the interior for them. You know, they gave us reasons why it's so big because they need extra storage without the, the basement.
I, that makes sense to me, but it's still a big house and so I think, you know, even if we might disagree with, you know, having five bedrooms that are very large that each come with their own en suite full bathroom, I don't think that's a reason to deny a project. But if it is just simply too big and, and would be substantially more detrimental to the neighborhood, I think that's, that's a reasonable conclusion. I'm not gonna try and talk anybody out of that. Yeah. But I would, if we are going to give them an opportunity to redesign it, we should give them some, some fairly clear guidance as to what might
be acceptable to the board. You know, is it, is it too tall? Is it too wide? Is it too close to the setbacks in the rear? And I don't wanna get into redesigning the house for them, but I, I think we need to give them some idea of what this board might be willing to Yeah. Speaker 7: And, and I'll start, I I think it's, I think there's plenty of opportunity to kind of nip and tuck it in, in a lot of places. And like Jason, I don't want to get into how to do it. I'll leave that too. People who know what they're doing here without losing much value or usable square feet there, there's, there's a lot
of just empty square footage. And if there, if there was, and that in and of itself is fine, but if the house is just so massive on, on the site, then that be, that becomes part of the issue. That is I think why I, I think with some thoughtful design exercise, I I I, I think you can shrink the size of the building, kind of meet our concerns without speaking for everybody else and still have a very sellable and a very attractive house. Speaker 19: So when we were building these two homes, I think in terms
of the, the overall design, both our colonial, I did get you said about the oversized master on 16 Westfield. So we have a, a different design on 79 Mill Street on in terms of the master. So would that be more suitable or could you give us any hints on in terms of what would be considered suitable for a Speaker 7: I was starting, Speaker 14: I took a quick glance at seven nine mil. It looked to me like an almost an identical layout. I think you're pushing the boundaries of mass so much
that even comparing it it to 79 mil wouldn't do it justice. You know, from my personal perspective, I think if you brought it in as you're looking at the front brought it in, that would be a big help. I can't really gauge the height. What was the height? Like 33 some odd? No, Speaker 11: 34 8 3 4 8 3 4 8. Speaker 14: So you pushing Speaker 11: Up Speaker 14: Against, you know like 79 mil won't work at 34 8 because you're not measuring property. You're measuring that from grade and not from the street. So 79 mil needs to change. Speaker 19: We already Speaker 14: Worked on the level, we'll get
to 79 mil in a second. Just my opinion that, you know, start by moving in and reduce the footprint. I'm not sure about the vertical depth 'cause I can't pull my map up and I don't know about the height, but just bringing it in some would be a huge help to reducing the footprint and I don't know what that would do for your interior spaces, et cetera. But what about the height guys? I mean, 34 8, you're, it works if it works. Speaker 11: I I mean from my standpoint, I, I would say that, I mean you could, you could easily reduce this by 10 to 15 percentage percentage points in,
in every parameter from the square footage to the height and still have a, a very nice looking house and, and a house that's still fairly large for the neighborhood and for this town. So that's just to throw out a parameter that means I'm not speaking for anybody else besides myself, but for giving out numbers, 10 to 15% on, on all parameters. Speaker 19: I would like to just point out in regards to the beauty heights. So both laws are, when, when we did these submitted these plans, both houses the building heights are not finalized
because there was groundwater at the time of measurement. So the, the most current results are actually about two feet lower than the current proposed building heights. So that's just to wanna mention about the building heights that we are secure with the building heights, it's not, right now it's 34, so in reality it would be 33. Speaker 11: So what does that mean exactly? The whole house is dropping or the roof is changing. How, how do you get that two feet?
Speaker 19: So when we did the, the test pits, there were only two hoses that were dug and then we dug formal more hoses on the second test test day. Yep. Which was more recent about 10 days ago. And we got better results at the water table level reading. So it, in reality, we could dug the foundation, dig the foundation deeper than we, what we are currently proposing because the, the building height of the current design are the results from the previous
soil test pits. Speaker 11: So right now it's a slab on you're saying you could, you could drop the slab more. Speaker 19: Yes. Lower Speaker 11: That. So yes, instead of four or five risers going up to the, the front door, Speaker 19: There would be no more handrail and you wouldn't need it. No, there would be no more handrail and the steps, it would be just one or two steps. Sounds Speaker 11: Like a step in the direction. Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess if that's sort of the consensus here Speaker 11: That Speaker 1: We're looking for something 10 to 15% smaller
and a foot or two shorter than what's shown on the plans. Even with that minor change, I think we'd wanna see revised plans to show the new height based on of course groundwater. So I think we'd have to continue anyway unless you wanted a vote tonight, which I don't think you do. So if you're okay taking this back and, and seeing what you can do to reduce the size of it, we would probably continue to May 19th for you. Is that something? Yeah, Speaker 19: Is it, does it apply for both addresses? No, we're gonna four 16th. Okay. Yeah Speaker 1: Sure. We'll deal with that one. Okay. So, okay.
Do we have a motion to continue this to May 19th Speaker 11: Move to I move, go ahead. Go ahead Anne. Okay. I move to continue this project until the next meeting on May 19th. All right, I'll second. Speaker 1: Thank you Jeff. All in favor? Alright, so we'll continue that one and we'll address the next one, which is 79 mil if you want to present that project. Speaker 13: Yeah, so the 79 mu street, it's also a two and a half stories and we have about 4,600 square feet of gross floor area
and the lot coverage, it's about 23.5 58%. It's about the same size and bedrooms and for the, for the lot. One second, I have it here, 79. So it's also a non-conforming lot that it's required a 15,000 square feet and we have 11 2 36, so a little shorter, but all the other required requirements from front side and back we are under, so it's required front yard at 30,
we are 29, the side is required 12, we have 63 and sorry, no we have 13 in this, the rear, it's not applicable for us. So the building coverage required is 25% and we have 23.58 and the, again, the building floor area is 46 10 square footage. Speaker 1: Okay, thanks. I probably should have read the public notice here, but it is application by the same applicant's as the last project for a finding under 48, section six
and nig zoning bylaws to raise existing single family and construct a new single family dwelling. Just for the record Speaker 7: On this one, you are very, this is a corner lot, correct? Correct. So you might have heard on our last presentation, it's not from the average finished grade, it's from the center line of the two abutting streets. And you look like approximately approximate finished grade is one 60. The road height is not listed here, but it looks like it's probably about 1 54, 1 55, 1 54
Speaker 1: And one fifty two Speaker 7: Over here. Let's call it one fifty three, one fifty four. That's just a condition of the, of the zoning bylaw. Excuse me. So you wanna pay very close attention to the height there. Basically you're, you have about five or six feet less than you think you do. Speaker 1: So we would ask if it isn't in the package already, and I don't think it is to have some sort of statement by your surveyor that they calculated the height of the building based on the nitty zoning bylaws that require measuring from the center line
of the two intersecting roads. Okay. Just for our comfort that you've properly calculated the height. Speaker 13: Yes. Yeah, Speaker 1: That's what I had. It looks like quite a lot of grading on the lot. Yeah, I mean I see proposed grade lines all over. Is it, what's, what's the plan there? Are you raising it or lowering it or just trying to smooth out some of the differences? Speaker 19: Yeah, so right now the two lots they have, we haven't started the activation, we just did the test pits, but they found a large boulder that's lying on the lots between, between the two lots
and hence there is also the, the beaver dam brook that's with the high water level reading. So we, we dug six holes total for, for two lots and we found that the results are much better than our previous reading. So we will have the plans from the engineers this week, which will be shown to you guys for the, for the next hearing about we, we will lower the,
the building height significantly. That one I'm sure. Speaker 1: Okay. And what's the purpose of the proposed retaining wall on the, what is it? West northwest side. I'm sorry? Northeast. Northeast Speaker 13: Here. It's where the tanks will be, right? Oh, Speaker 1: Looks like you might need that for your driveway. Speaker 19: Yeah, so so this one, this is because of this was done from the last soil test as well. So this is not accurate. The reason it has that retaining wall there because they found the water table level high there
and they need to do a storm water management tank. So, but now we won't have that issue. We will place the storm water management tank on the bottom. Bottom right. Yeah. This side, right? Speaker 13: Yeah. Here. Yeah. Speaker 19: So yeah, that's, that's not accurate. We will update that with the, the next here as well. Speaker 1: Okay. Yeah, so it sounds like we're definitely gonna be continuing this one. Okay. Move detention. Speaker 11: Jason, I was kind of buried in looking at the drawings
but then did you guys, you talked about the, it's corner lot and it's where the at where, where grade is gonna Speaker 1: Yep, yep, yep. There's, it Speaker 14: Looks like it's 34.8 from grade according to this drawing. Yeah. And it looks like the street drops six, seven feet, Speaker 7: It'll be 40, like 41 according two feet Speaker 1: On Speaker 13: Average. But the driveway will not be in OW street. The drywall will be on Westfield. Yes. Road. It's right. We try to avoid because it's a busy street so we wanna move it, which Speaker 7: Is good. Yeah. Which we like, but read up on the bylaw about
how to determine a lot and it's, that's gonna hurt you on this one. Just I should say it's gonna hurt you, it's gonna affect how you design the hike. Thank you. Speaker 1: That was my question. Any other thoughts on the board? Anyone from the audience wanted to speak on the 79 Mill Street project? No. Yes. Yes. Speaker 20: Hello? Gail Weston Roberts Natick resident. Oh yeah. You guys still doing streets or just town? Because I know some of the other boards are just doing town address now as opposed to street.
Speaker 1: I think we asked for the street address but Okay. I think we know where you live. Speaker 20: Yeah, yeah. But you know, not everybody does so yeah, 26 Western Avenue. Yeah, I just, I was confused when I looked at the drawings this afternoon about the elevation, the grading, creating a much higher elevation and, but I wasn't sure, I was reading the drawings right. There was one point where it looked like it was 1 5 3 and another one where it was 1 6 3 and so I, yeah, it maybe this is no longer relevant because you folks are already saying come back
with better grading information specifically. Yeah, I Speaker 1: Think, yeah, they're gonna show more detail on the grading. I think it's gonna change because of the new water table elevations and also to confirm that the height of the building was correctly calculated. Speaker 20: Okay. Yeah. And so just the one other thing is there's a number of projects tonight that had this issue, but it looks like the neighbors have trees that are very close to the property line. And if you are putting, if you're, you know, kind of filling the envelope for that lot and getting very close to the property line, then
are we talking about excavating some of the neighbors tree roots? How, how close is it on the to, to the setback? How close is it to the property line where those trees are? They're not Speaker 13: No, we, we respected all the setbacks and we have here the requirements in our site plan. So we were requested on the right side 12 and we did 14.8 in the left side. It's 12 and we did 13. Speaker 20: Okay. But I mean on the neighbor's side of the fence, the line, Speaker 13: So that side, it's the one we,
we are very far from. So the minimum, the closest we are, it's almost 15, but in the back will be much more than that. Speaker 20: Okay. Speaker 13: Yeah, the house was plot a little bit angled just so we could create Yeah, a little bit more backyard. So you should have no problem with that. Okay. Speaker 20: Thank you. Thanks. Speaker 1: Anyone else from the audience? No. Any other comments, questions from the board? Nope. I think we're looking for a motion to continue to May 19th then we can change some
of the elevations and revise the plans. Yeah. Speaker 7: Move to continue to May 19th, Speaker 1: Jeff? Second. Second. All right. All those in favor, did I? I'll get you next time. Alright, we'll see you on May 19th. Alright, thank you. Speaker 13: Thank you. Speaker 1: Let's see. Next up we've got 25 Irving Road, an application by Mark Cahill for a finding. Massachusetts general law 48 section six NA zoning bylaws five B and four B and five a Applicant proposed to raise the existing single family dwelling and construct a new single family dwelling on the existing pre preexisting nonconforming lot as shown on the plans.
Do we have a mark? Speaker 2: This is just frontage right down here. Frontage, I think. I think it's just frontage, Speaker 1: Gentlemen. Yes. Feel free to introduce yourself and tell us what you wanna wanna tell us. Speaker 21: Good evening. My name's Neil Glick, attorney for 25 Irving Road, LLC. Mark Cahill, the manager of the LLC is here with me and Speaker 2: I have a handout for the board. Thank you. Paper, if I may. Thank you. I think I've made enough copies this time.
Thank you. And if anybody Speaker 21: In the audience, I have a couple of extras here, if anybody Speaker 2: Okay. Is this a separate plot and they just like parcel, like what's that? This, yeah, two blocks. I don't think it's two far. Oh, it's just the backyard. Yeah, I think it's just Speaker 1: The floor is yours. Tell us what you'd like to, to tell us. We're Speaker 21: Here for 25 Irving Road. This is a new single family residence that's very similar to other homes in the neighborhood. It meets well the, the advantage of this property is
that, and I want the board to keep this in mind, is that unlike almost every other house in this subdivision, any other lot in this subdivision, we don't have a lot size problem. Almost every other lot in the subdivision is 15,000 square feet. This one has almost 20,000 more than that. So we've got plenty of lot space on this property. The only non-conformity is a hundred feet of frontage, whereas now you require 120.
Obviously when this subdivision was laid out in 1953, built out in 1954, along with the subdivision just to the south of it, the Weathersfield D section, all of the lots were 15,000 square feet, a hundred, a hundred square, a hundred feet of frontage. So we're, well, well within that we, as I said, the required lot size is exceeded by almost 20,000 square feet. Required. Lot depth is exceeded by 25 feet.
Front yard setback is exceeded by 13 feet. Rear yard setback is exceeded by 50 feet. And on the sides, the side yard setbacks are 26 feet and 38 feet greater than currently required. Building height is less than the maximum allowed by over a foot. Building coverage is 6.5% less than the maximum allowed. So we're here for a finding under 40 a section six that it's not more, that it's not more detrimental
to the neighborhood, more substantially more detrimental to the neighborhood. I would suggest that this actually is in conformity with the way the neighborhood is going. And if you look on the second page, there's plenty of lots right near this property where this board has granted similar relief, if not more, both lot size and frontage. Right on Irving Road, Liberty, Richard Road and Emerson Road. I chose those streets deliberately
could go further afield within the subdivision. Those were the streets that you gave a butter's notice to. So it's really in the, the heart of the neighborhood. If you look at Exhibit A, you'll see the plans both elevations and floor plans. We are a total living area of 3,685 square feet. And again, consistent with a great many of the houses now being built in this neighborhood. Exhibit C shows
the property in green. I actually transposed 25 and 29. We're gonna do 29 next, Speaker 6: But if I may, if you're looking at exhibit C, I've got 29 in green. 25 is actually the, the bigger lot back here. Speaker 1: The corner lot. Yeah. Yeah. Speaker 6: It's, yeah, you could call it corner lot, Speaker 1: A lot on the corner. Right. Speaker 21: But you can see that the lots in yellow are clustered all around this. And these are lots where you've granted relief.
Again, similar size houses, similar styles, similar zoning relief, although even more in, in most cases 'cause you've got lot size relief as well. So, and then just to make it clear in a picture is worth the proverbial thousand words. Exhibit D has some of those houses in pictorial form and you can see that they're very similar in size and and style. And again, this is indicative
of the way this, this many homes, many lots in this neighborhood are going. I'll add that Mr. Cahill has been active in this neighborhood. He's approval from you recently for 39 Irving Road. Similar size, much smaller lot. And a special permit was granted back in August of 24. And, and also on 17 Emerson Street. That's August of 2023. Again, very similar situation, similar design.
And in that case you had a sm the Nonconformities were a smaller lot and the frontage, so Mr. Cahill builds a good product. I'm told it's being well received in the neighborhood and we believe that this is not more detrimental to the neighborhood. We think it's, it's an addition to the neighborhood. Speaker 1: All right, thank you. I had a couple questions. Looking at the plans this afternoon. One is, the height proposed is 33 7 inches, which is only about a foot and a half below the maximum if I do my math right.
But you're also raising the grade it looks like, of the lot. And I know, you know, the building commissioner measures the height of a building one way, but when we're considering a a, a section six finding like this, I take into consideration how much the grade is changing in addition to the new actual height of the structure. And so to me, if the grade is changing by a foot, that puts you at about 34 foot seven inches, which is getting very close to the, the maximum. It's, it's, it is, it appears to be below 35 foot. So I don't think that's
a new violation or a new, Speaker 22: You know, can I make a comment? Speaker 1: Absolutely. Speaker 22: Both. Well, we'll speak one at a time. This house has the ability to put a basement in it. And these lots are extremely level. So that foot that I'm bringing the grade up allows me to shed the water away from the house, which is the code requirement. So that's the reason I do it on a, on any, most of the lots in this neighborhood are very level. So I usually do a foot just so that I get a little bit of pitch away from the house. Sure. Speaker 7: Yeah. It's hard to tell from this. And I'm kind of looking at,
is the grade actually being raised or kind of re Speaker 1: Pushed around? Pushed Speaker 22: Around? It's a foot, it's a foot up against the house and then it's just meeting, meeting the meeting the existing grades. Yeah. Speaker 14: So it looks like it's the 1 59 that you're looking at. Looks like the raised height. Speaker 7: Yeah. Talking because, because there is a existing 1 58 grade. Yep, yep. Near the existing dwelling. Speaker 1: I, I didn't think it was a, it was a concern of mine, but I didn't think that you needed to change the design because of that. And I just wanted the board members and the audience to be aware of what I was thinking.
The other thought that I was having was about stormwater infiltration. And I, I think on the next one at 29 you propose, I, I see on the plans a stormwater infiltration system. I didn't see one on these plans. Are you proposing one for this project? Speaker 7: Yes, we've, Speaker 22: Oh, the, the, the plan has been developed about, about a week or two ago, but it's now part of the permit process. I went through conservation for 29 and they required it. So it was submitted at that time. It has been developed for this house and it, it's in the old days, I used to do it
before I applied for a permit, but now it goes in with the building permit and gets approved during that period. Does that answer your question? Speaker 1: Yeah, I just wanted to make sure because we saw a couple of letters from Board of Health and Engineering, I think. And Speaker 22: It's a requirement for the permit. Yeah. Yeah. And, and I do have the plan. Okay, Speaker 1: Good. Yep. That was, those were my concerns. Anybody else on the board thoughts? Speaker 14: What goes on? What's this big drop off that I see behind Irving? Looks like there's a big steep drop off while I'm looking at
your, your topo Speaker 22: There is Speaker 11: On the, Speaker 14: And of the neighbors behind there, are they close up to this lot? Line and Speaker 22: N no. Do you know of? Speaker 14: No. No. And they've never experienced any water issues with the existing structure. Okay. Speaker 21: Well, and we're, we're well away from the neighbors in the rear. Speaker 14: Okay. It doesn't show on this map. Okay. Speaker 22: No, it, it slopes down to a wetland, which does not affect my property. But it all goes into a Yeah. Wetland. Not into other people's properties. Speaker 6: I'm curious, are there any other budding houses
that are two two story? Are they all one story? Speaker 22: The ones to the rear are two story, which are over on Emerson, Speaker 6: But right next to each of the letters are all same, right? Speaker 22: That's correct. That's correct. Speaker 6: So you provided us a double two stories, right? Speaker 22: That's correct. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 6: So that's a concern to me. Speaker 1: Yeah. If you look at Alan, if you look at the map that he gave, yeah. You can see some of the ones that have been recently built. We, I remember the one we just approved on Irving at Liberty is one of the more recent ones. Speaker 21: Yep. That would be one Liberty Speaker 1: Probably. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 22: There's another one on Irving that's going up that's probably three houses up on the same size across from Richard Road. Oh really? Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 22: That one's under construction. That one started about the same time that the house I'm completing at 39 or Speaker 1: Alan, just to be clear, I'm including you on this vote. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Should we flip it to, you got something Speaker 11: I just, I'm sorry. Is it begins with Ari and goes to Yeah, yeah, we'll do that.
Yep. But Speaker 1: We welcome your comments. Speaker 11: Thank you. Well I do appreciate that it's a much bigger site. I know we're not comparing and contrasting, but let's compare and contrast to the previous projects. Smaller building, much bigger site. So Speaker 14: It's a weird site. It's almost begging for a variance Speaker 2: With Speaker 14: The lot lines or something. Speaker 1: Yeah, it's got so much area but only a little bit French. Yeah, Speaker 14: So much area with a little tiny a hundred foot. 'cause it's on a curve. Yeah. Speaker 7: But otherwise it's perfectly normal. Speaker 1: It probably conformed one day in the past. Right? Speaker 7: What do you mean it's begging for a variance?
If there wasn't a house there, you could easily get a variance for building this house on that line. I see what you're saying. But, Speaker 21: But I, there's a, to be, to be clear where, to be clear, we're not asking for a variance. Speaker 1: We don't need one. Speaker 7: Alright, Speaker 1: Andrew, or should we open it to the audience? Do you have anything? Speaker 11: Just kind of an observation. So it's, I mean it's very similar to four Emerson Street. You've added one garage, just kind of seeing the Speaker 22: That's correct. Speaker 11: It's interesting. It's always helpful to see things in 3D if it's a photo or a, a model image.
I just think it ends up selling the project so much better than the elevations because they, they just propose this sort of a wall of structure. So the photos are good, but I'm not voting on this one. So Speaker 1: Anyone in the audience wanted to speak provide any comments, questions about, we got 25 Irving, 25 Irving, please give us your name and your address and what else? Hi, Speaker 20: Victoria Grafflin 45 Westlake Road. I didn't actually come initially to speak on this, but I do live in the neighborhood so I thought I would sort
of share a comment that's gonna be similar to a comment I'll make on another one of the neighborhood houses. I'm not sure that everybody in the neighborhood agrees that all these very large houses going in are good for the neighborhood in this case. I think I have kind of a question. I see that I'm, I'm familiar with this property. There's a couple of really nice trees that border the street and I'm just wondering if the development will be able to preserve at least those street bordering trees or if there are any plans to preserve any of the other trees
that provide shade, privacy habitat, et cetera for the neighborhood. Speaker 1: Okay. To address that, Speaker 11: There are trees on the street. Speaker 22: Yeah, I don't, I don't believe that those trees in the front of the lot need to be removed. There is a dead tree on the right of the current house and there's another one that's gonna be close to the front on the right and there's a couple of pines on the left. But the usual procedure is we meet with Claire and we talk about the trees that need to be removed
and we mitigate what's been removed by replacing them. Speaker 1: This board has been known to require or impose conditions on vegetated buffers or replacing certain trees with certain other tree species if they had to be removed. So that could be a condition if we choose to approve the project. Or it could be as open-ended as work with Claire and the neighbors on a, on a tree planting plan. Speaker 22: It's part of the storm water permitting process. Okay.
With Claire right now we just did it at, at 39 Irving. She has a plant, she comes out, we talk about what trees are gonna be removed and then we talk about how that's gonna be mitigated at the end. And then we in at 39 and typically we'll have a second discussion just because I like to have, make sure we're on the same page about what's gonna be planted. Okay. And it's, it's actually worked out pretty well. I did a house up at 46 Weathersfield, I had a neighbor in the back and I put a nice sugar maple back there.
That's gonna be a good buffer for both the neighbors over the years. So I try to work with, you know, with the neighbors when they come up and Claire because she's got some opinions about what she wants put back Speaker 1: And she holds the permit Speaker 22: And she holds the storm water permit and they sign off on the storm water permit. So Speaker 1: Does that answer your question? Speaker 20: Yeah, thank you. I actually appreciate knowing that as a developer you do try to mitigate with the trees just because I'm just gonna say the neighborhood is losing a mature trees at such an alarming rate that it's beginning
to look like Queens, New York, you know, fences instead of trees bordering all the properties. So my hope is that, you know, developers in this neighborhood will try to the extent possible to preserve the mature existing shade trees and if they have to take something down 'cause it's dead or it's impossible to work around that, what they replace it with. I love hearing that there's a sugar maple going up in the back of this other one isn't just Arbor Es for example. So thank you Speaker 21: If I may on that, on that point.
Sure. I think it's important for the, the board to keep in mind that whatever relief you grant gets recorded at the registry of deeds and then it's forever. So if you start, are I guess the, what I, what I'm getting at is the permitting process that Mark Cahill just outlined is the right process. It's, it's a, it's a mechanism to get trees preserved that to be treated,
preserved that are healthy. It's a mechanism to regulate, I guess construction with fencing around the trees that are gonna be preserved, et cetera, et cetera. But if this board starts writing conditions that are gonna get recorded that, you know, x maple 15 feet from the street needs to be kept in perpetuity, that gets to be problematic because you can never prove that and trees die. So I, I think the idea of having
vegetation is a good one, but I think it's properly in the province of the con com and Board of Health. Speaker 1: I'll say, I think you and I are in violent agreement on that point, but if we conditioned it for, as you said, to preserve a tree in perpetuity, it wouldn't be the first time this board did that. Speaker 21: I understand, but I, but Speaker 1: I think that I agree with that. I'm more in agreement with your way of thinking, Speaker 21: But then I'll then I'll sit down and shut up Speaker 1: This, this board has done some other things in the past, so Speaker 21: I I know that's why I, I thought you might be going in
that direction and I wanted to try to, Speaker 1: I don't steer this ship. Okay. Speaker 21: There's a difference between what the developer can do and what the subsequent owner can do after that. That's true too. Yeah. Speaker 1: Any other comments, questions from anyone in the audience please? Speaker 23: Marjorie Wane 16 Richard Road. I just wanted to agree with the previous speaker that the character of the neighborhood is being changed drastically and not everybody is in agreement that it should be changed or, and it's really a shame that a lot
of these houses aren't just being rehabbed because people are looking for one story houses and they do look nice. I think Mr. Cahill has done a very nice job on what he's done, but I don't know that everybody's in agreement that it's an improvement. Also, I was concerned about the vegetation, which you just brought up, but there are a lot of trees. It's a very nice shaded lot and when you lose those trees, it's, it's a shame. And a lot of the developers are just putting up houses with small windows and not very attractive properties
and not doing much with landscaping. So I just wanna make sure that there is good landscaping and that it does look nice. And I noticed that it does have a three car garage, which is very large on the property. Do I just have those comments? Speaker 1: Thank you. If you wanted to respond to any of that or, or not. It's up to you if you want to talk a little bit more about your landscape plan or is that not yet developed? You'll work on that with the neighbor and Claire. Well, Speaker 22: It, it's not developed, but I do, what I've done at
39 Irving and 46 Weathersfield and on Emerson is, is is pretty similar to what I do. My landscaper tends to throw a lot of plant material in my at, in my beds, including the rear rears of the house. So I like to think that, that my houses get more landscaping than a lot of my competition. And I'm also, I, I have got a track record of working with neighbors there, a house. I did a house on Emerson and there was a neighbor in the back that didn't want me
to take down a a a Norway maple, which I think Norway's on the evasive list. And, and that tree got saved. Planting the sugar maple at, at Weathersfield. I try not to take any tree that I don't have to take and I like to think that I should take more, but I I, I purposely do not take trees that I do not have to take. Okay. Speaker 6: How many trees do you think, excuse me. How many trees of road do you think will be eliminated by this building? 'cause I'm looking at the green space and I find is very beautiful. Speaker 22: There's probably half a dozen, there's one in the back
of the house that's gonna need to be removed and there's some pine trees on the left that are very close, but, and there's a, there's a dead spruce in the front yard. But, you know, it's similar to what I did at the 39 Irving. And Claire has a lot of input and she gets what she wants. Speaker 21: Yeah. And when you say Mark, when you say that's that Speaker 22: Bad, She's very persuasive. I I, maybe I could've said it better. We know we work well together, you know, we're on the same page as far as you know, you know
that this tree definitely needs to be taken and then we'll plant something. I don't, Irving has had two trees in the front yard and one of them is, is very odd. It's got a big probably 30 inch limb that goes out toward the street. So, you know, we, but we preserve that and I planted another oak tree with the plan that over time, that as that tree gets bigger over the next 20 years, that this tree is probably gonna need to be removed or, or may be diseased or something. And this one will take its place.
So I, I do spend time, you know, on the sites, you know, looking at trying to preserve what I can and then planting additional material. Speaker 21: And, and Mark, I think when you mentioned that number, a good chunk of that are conifers, not deciduous trees. So people are talking about shade trees from the comments we've heard. And it's not like you're going out and cutting down shade trees. You're, there were some, I I heard you mention
that there were some pine trees or conifers that needed to be either thinned out or removed at Speaker 22: Least, at least half of the trees that I'll be taking. Yeah. Speaker 21: Yeah. Speaker 2: Okay. Anything else? No comments, no Speaker 22: Question. Anyone from the audience? Yes, Speaker 2: I, Speaker 20: Gail Western Roberts, 26 Western Avenue. So I took photos of this lot a couple days ago and it's essentially a grove of trees with a house in the middle of it. I can't remember. I is, does the plot show which trees are being removed?
Because I don't recall that being indicated. I, I can't tell from the street whether these very large pine trees and others that are toward the rear and the sides if they are on this lot or on the neighbor's lot. But if they are on the, on your lot, then, then my question becomes do, are the neighbors aware that most of those are going to be removed because they are a significant part
of this property? And they, if anyone would like to look at the photos on my phone, 'cause I'm not sure. Google Street view shows you just how many trees and how tall they are, including the conifers, which obviously that's kind of great to have, even if it's not deciduous. If anybody'd like to look, I can show you. Speaker 22: No, thank you. Right ahead. Thank you. Speaker 20: Oh, I'm sorry. I was hoping for an answer from, from Mr. Cahill. Are those trees, the trees that are gonna be removed, is that on the plot elevation or not?
Speaker 22: They're not. Speaker 20: Okay. So the neighbors don't know by looking at the documents what trees are being removed? Speaker 22: No, there's, there's no, there's no town requirement right now for tree surveys and inventories about what's gonna be removed. It's all done, like I said, through sidewalks with Claire. With Claire. Claire Relli is the conservation agent. Yes. Yep. And she does the storm water with the board of health. So she's, she's doing, she's doing both of those. But yeah.
Let me ask you this then. Would the, would Claire or Speaker 1: Yourself invite the neighbors to come on the sidewalk with you and Claire to indicate or to at least show which trees would be cut? Speaker 22: It's not something that I've done, but, well, on, on Emerson at 17 Emerson, I had a neighbor, but she had a tree in particular. She lived directly in back of the property and she had a tree in mind that I wasn't gonna cut. So that's the only time, well, at 46 Weathersfield, I had a neighbor that became friendly from walking by the site and we talked about putting a tree in the back
and we agreed and we did it. No, so, but no, it's not a common practice to have the neighbors come, but it's not something that I'm opposed to. I feel strongly that that Claire's doing a very good job. You know, she's not easy. Yeah. But we're, we're on the right, we're on the same page as far as you know, what's being cut and trying to replace something that's gonna be beneficial to the site going forward. Speaker 21: And Mark, you're, you're also, as I understand it
and as the building permit plan shows, you're, you're removing some structures on the, on, on the property other than not, not the house, but there's, Speaker 22: There's a shed structure Speaker 21: A shed, there's a shed in the back that's encroaching. So you're opening up more open space frankly on the, on the, on the house or on the lot, Speaker 22: Not a lot of trees in the backyard. I think there's just one in the back of the house and there's these pines, two or three pines on the left and I think two in the front. But there isn't, there isn't a significant
amount of trees in the backyard that need to be removed. Speaker 1: Okay. Does that answer your question? Speaker 20: Yeah, I, I, this looks like a lot more than three trees. To me. Speaker 24: This is a lot of trees. That's why I was asking is it beyond the lot line or inside the lot line because there are a lot, lot. Speaker 22: See this is, this is, this is, well the existing house is gonna be where this house is. So it, it's like those two pine trees back in there. There isn't anything down this sideline because Speaker 24: I have to, so all of these other trees, they belong to the neighbors propose?
Speaker 22: No. Speaker 24: Or they're, you're just not gonna need to take 'em out. There's so Speaker 22: Far back. That's correct. Okay. The only ones that, that are close to the house are those pine trees right there. But everything, everything to the left of those pine trees going down the hill that way is gonna Speaker 24: Stay. It's not an envious yet. Okay. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Okay. I think, well we've got Allen voting this way. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Any more questions, comments, thoughts?
Motions? Speaker 14: I'll make a motion. Speaker 2: Would I would Speaker 14: Hmm. I move that we approve the application for ZB 25, 10, 25 Irving Street. Finding that it is not, the proposed structure on the site is not substantially more detrimental than the existing site. Seeing as the only non-compliance is the a hundred foot frontage frontage, everything else far exceeds code requirements subject to being built in substantially accordance
with the plan submitted and approved and subject to compliance with the town letters in particular conservation with its recommendation for stormwater management. Speaker 2: Sounds Speaker 1: Good. Is there a second? Second. Second. Jeff. All in favor from Alan this way. Thank you. You got that one. Speaker 14: Let's Speaker 2: Do it again. Fast forward. Speaker 21: Yeah. Now we move to, now we move to 20 up the street, two lots up the street to 29 Irving, Speaker 1: Let me just read this Speaker 2: For a second.
I think I'm gonna take off. That's fine. Speaker 1: Lemme just read that for the record. We've got an application for 29 Irving Road by Mark Cahill for a finding under 48 section six and the native zoning bylaws for B and five A. The applicant propose to raise the existing single family dwelling and construct a new single family dwelling on the preexisting nonconforming lot as shown on the plans. Counselor Speaker 21: Again for the record, my name's Neil Glick, attorney for 29 Irving, LLC Irving Road, LLC.
Mark Kayhill is the manager of that LLC and he's here with me. Speaker 1: If I can interrupt for a second, Andrews has to leave for another appointment so we're gonna got the quorum. We're all set. Okay. Andrew's excused. Speaker 2: Thank you sir. Speaker 1: Thank you for your service. Speaker 2: Yes, we still have a court. Speaker 1: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Speaker 2: Missing the brains there though. Yeah, that's why we get the three bucks. Speaker 14: Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. And again, sorry to run out here. You can share. Okay, thank you. Speaker 1: If I could, counselor, I'm just gonna run down the zoning
list to speed things along. It looks like the lot area required is 20,000. You've got 15. That seems to be the only non-conformity, I'm sorry. And the lot frontage Speaker 21: Lots and the frontage frontage frontage, Speaker 1: Lot frontage 120 required and a hundred is existing lot depth. 1 25, 1 50, existing front yard 30 with 31 proposed side yard 12 with 16, proposed side yard 12 with 16 proposed rear yard 25 with 76 proposed building coverage, 20% going to 15, sorry,
24.6. Currently going to 15.6 and building height 35 maximum. Currently 14 foot eight going to 34 foot nine inches. Speaker 21: Yes. And I would add to that, and I think it's significant is we're eliminating an existing non-conformity on the lot. There's a addition that was built that is only 5.1 feet from the side on the right side as you face from the street. We're eliminating that non-conformity. And our side yard setbacks are actually, as you just said,
four feet greater than what's required. Appreciate it. So we're, Speaker 1: Thanks for the clarification. Speaker 21: Yep. Speaker 22: There's also a shed in the back corner that's on the lot line and in the 25 foot buffer zone that's gonna be removed. Speaker 21: Yeah. Okay. Again, part of the 1953 subdivision built in 1954, built out in 1954. And it's very consistent with almost all of the lots in that subdivision
and the neighboring one, whether it's field D, whereby you have 15,000 square foot lots and a hundred feet of frontage, which obviously was the requirement back then and it's been tightened up since or expanded since then. So again, you've got plans attached as Exhibit A, both facades, elevations, and floor plans. We are at 3,685 square feet of total living space. Four bedrooms, another center,
center entrance, colonial, nicely designed, compatible with other properties in the neighborhood. And if you look at exhibit C, which again I trans, I apologize, I transposed, but Just moved the green up two lots, that's 29 Irving. But you can see it's all of the yellow lots are ones that have been built as two stories plus
they're practically surrounding on Irving, Richard, Emerson and Liberty, I, there are many others in the subdivision, but these are the ones that are in closest proximity to the locust. And they are also the ones that Abutters were given notice on. And exhibit D once again shows pictures of some of those other lots, many of them. Like 10 Richard Road special permit granted by this board in 2018.
Same total living area 11 Irving Road, same situation. A 15,150 square foot lot, a hundred foot of frontage, just a little bit less. 31 64 Total living area. Again, special permit granted in 2006, one Liberty, that's a corner lot but it's a 15,000 square foot lot. 3,481 Total living area special permit in 2022. I think that's the one that the chair was referring to.
And Mr. Cahill has obtained relief from this board in very similar situations on 17 Emerson and 39 Irving Road, which is just up the street, same kind of thing on 39 Irving Road, 15,007 square foot frontage and depth on that one were less than what was required. We don't have that problem on 29, Emerson was
a frontage requirement of a hundred feet. And again the requested special permit relief was granted. So with that, I'll turn it over to the board's questions. We think again that this is not more substantially more detrimental to the neighborhood at all. Speaker 1: Okay, thank you. I think I was looking for a little more explanation on the grading in the back, why that was necessary. I looks like it's in the buffer zone. So you're gonna be dealing with conservation commission or you already have, and then I see this proposed retaining wall, it almost looks like it was installed
to protect a tree. Speaker 22: That's correct. Yeah. Speaker 21: And we do have an order of conditions from the con com. Speaker 1: So you're all set with them right now. Speaker 21: We are all set with that. It's not in a resource protected resource area is in the local bylaw buffer. It's not even in the state bylaw buffer, but it's in the local bylaw buffer. And we're fine with the order of conditions that we, that we have. It's mostly for protective barriers during construction. Speaker 1: You wanna tell me just in two minutes about all the grading in the back and, and the tree?
Speaker 22: Yeah, so the, the, the grading slopes down from the back of the house to the wetlands at approx at approximately where the, it's actually a fence, I believe it's, it's just in front of the shed. So the shed's gonna be removed in one tree and I'm gonna bring the grade up and then slope at three to one to the lot line and plant that with wetlands plantings that have been approved by the board. So that back in essence 25 feet will be on the wetland
side of the fence and there'll be a a somewhat level backyard or as, as, as good as I could get considering the, the circumstances. And there's a tremendous amount of impervious cover back there that's being reduced. Right. There's a fountain patios the shed and that's all part of the conservation plan and approval. Speaker 21: Is the fountain new or existing? Speaker 22: It's existing. Speaker 21: You gonna keep it? Speaker 22: No, Speaker 1: It's a feature. And this is the lot again, like number 25. But 2029 we have the plan showing the infiltration
system. That's Speaker 22: Correct. Yes. Speaker 1: Just because you had to do it for the conservation commission Speaker 22: At the first meeting, they, they requested it, it, it had actually come in the night before, so I, I submitted it and it was part of the approval. Speaker 1: And then I don't see too many trees remo, I don't see too many trees on the lot shown there's, Speaker 22: There's three trees in the backyard that, that the conservation has agreed that I could re remove. And they're gonna be replanted Speaker 1: And build a retaining role around the one to preserve that one? Speaker 22: That's correct, yes. Speaker 1: That's pretty good. Anyone from the board,
just the five of us now? Comments? Questions? Anyone in the audience with comments or questions about number 29? Yes. Speaker 2: I mean you're taking out a lot of impervious area. Speaker 20: Me again? Gail Weston Roberts. So maybe I read the drawings wrong, but I had a question about the depth of the cellar or basement. What I was seeing was that it's going to be 8.9 feet deep and the estimated high ground groundwater is
seven and a half feet from the surface. So I'm wondering how that's gonna work if I, if I read this correctly. Speaker 1: You wanna talk to that? Speaker 2: Well that's your water table. No, it's this way. Speaker 22: So the, this is similar to what I mentioned at the other house is that the grade is coming up a foot over the existing grade and the foundation will be a foot above that. So that's actually two feet above the existing grade, which gets me about 18 inches over the water table.
And the requirement is 12, the 24 inches that Speaker 1: Gets you that clearance to the groundwater table. With what height of basement? Speaker 22: An eight foot basement. Okay. Speaker 20: Or 8.9. Yes. Speaker 22: No, Speaker 20: Almost nine feet. No, Speaker 22: No. It, it's, well it's, it, it includes the footing, the separation from, from, got it from. So part of that, and, and it's not a perfect world because it's an eight foot board and you never get eight feet, so you'll end up with, you know, oh right. Seven 11 and then the footing is the same way. So,
Speaker 20: Okay. Yeah, as long as it's within the rules, that's what matters. Right. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. See no other hands raised. I see another hand raised Speaker 23: Marjorie Waner 16 Richard, there is a very nice magnolia in front of the house. Is that gonna go? Speaker 22: Yes, yes. There's talk about trying to do something with it and I'm not sure whether that's gonna be practical or not. 'cause it's, it's, it's big but it's right in the front of the house. So I don't know for for sure, but I don't think it's gonna be physically possible to move that tree.
Speaker 1: Would Speaker 23: There be something equivalent that you could put someplace else? 'cause it's, it's a lovely tree. Speaker 22: Yeah, I don't know that I'd use the word equivalent because because of the size of the tree, I, I like to think long term with my trees. I like to think of what they're gonna look like in 20 or 30 years. So, you know, something will be planted and over time it will be ornamental and hopefully attractive. And again, that's something that, you know, will be discussed with, with Claire. Speaker 1: Does that answer? Yes. Okay. Unfortunately. Yeah. Yeah. Any other questions from the committee?
Nothing else in the audience Speaker 14: Questions? Say again? I had basement questions, but they're 32 feet. I'm great and I'm good. Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. I think it looks like a pretty good plan. I like that it's reducing the footage, the, the footprint of structures, reducing the amount of impervious area. I think that's a lot of it could be called an improvement there. Speaker 21: Significantly. Significantly. And there's a cottage actually in the back that's being removed. Yeah, I mean it's, it's not just a shed, it's a, on the plant, it's shown as a cottage. Speaker 1: So that was well within the buffer zone. Yeah, Speaker 22: That's correct. Yeah. It was only
Speaker 14: Downhill slope Speaker 1: Here. Is there a motion anyone would like to make sure Speaker 14: I move? That we approve ZB 25, 11 29 Irving Road. Seeing as the proposed structure is not substantially more detrimental than the current subject to it being developed and substantially in accordance to the plan submitted and in compliance with the letters submitted from the town. Speaker 1: Thank you. Second hurry. All in favor? Five.
Oh, got that one. Speaker 22: Gonna ask a quick question. When you say substantially in compliance, would the plan submitted, submitted, if I was to connect the front porch would sits by itself to the garage to make a front porch bigger? Would that fall under that definition or would that be a, if Speaker 14: You wanted to connect it to the garage? Speaker 22: That's correct. Speaker 14: I think if you connect garage to the main structure, you're extending the actual surface area when you're extending the, the structure. So that's, that's substantially more
detrimental if you're putting a Speaker 1: Well, it's a, it's a change. Speaker 14: It's a change if you're putting a portico up and then as long as you're staying within the com you know, all the, the setbacks, et cetera, that's not substantially. But Speaker 7: If you're connecting it to a garage, so you're, it's getting longer along the front facade. Well Speaker 21: I think you're referring to the porch though. You're not referring. Correct. The the garage is already connected. Got it. To the house. And it's, it's, Speaker 7: So Speaker 25: If I connected, if I connected this roof into here, there you go. Speaker 7: Oh, with what? My, Speaker 25: My broker chases me for, for,
for front porches. If I, if I connected that Speaker 7: Porch line would, oh, it made that. Speaker 1: Or even substantial Speaker 7: Chain Speaker 1: Give an overhang in front of the whole No, no, no. Speaker 7: It would die right Speaker 25: To here. It would die right there. Would that be Speaker 7: No, you're just, you're just extending the roof, you're extending the porch. Yeah. I don't think so. Not impacting any of your setbacks at Speaker 1: All. Doesn't change the footprint doesn't change the impervious Speaker 21: And it's, it's open to the air. I Speaker 1: Think Speaker 7: So, yeah. I think it's, I have to that be something that it approved or I would've, to tell you what, let's condition it right now. Well,
Speaker 1: Hearing's closed. We already voted. Speaker 7: I'm sure Dave, Dave, Dave would send it back if it, I would, I would be, I would be salty if we had to see it again Dave. Dave will send it back and he thinks it's, thank you. Substantial change. Thank you all. Thank you. Have a good night. Speaker 1: We've been here two hours. Why don't we take a five minute break and Speaker 7: The rest of them take them out while Speaker 1: We get back. So we're gonna recess for five minutes. Thank Speaker 7: You. Speaker 1: We have an application for Peter Beamus for a finding under Mass General Law 40 a section six of the general nat zoning bylaws four B
and five a applicant proposes raise the existing single family dwelling and construct a new single family dwelling on the pre-existing nonconforming law as shown on the plans for number two West Lake Road. Yes sir. Speaker 26: Good evening. Zachary Beamus with engineering design consultants. Currently two West Lakeland Road is a single family dwelling. It has a front yard setback violation on Irving Road. The proposal is to raise that structure, construct a new structure that will be in full compliance with all front and side yard setbacks being a corner lot.
It does not have a rear yard. The froze building height from top of foundation to roof fridge is 33 feet eight inches based on the architectural plans from Shane's structures. And with regards to the site work, there's some proposed grading to accommodate the squaring of the lot. The driveway will load in from Irving Road, the front of the house will be off of Westlake Road. One tree is proposed to be removed in the location of the proposed driveway and there are two onsite stormwater infiltration chambers to help infiltrate stormwater generated on the
roof of the new structure. With that, I'd be happy to take any questions from the board. Speaker 1: Thank you. Just looking at the zoning list again here, let's see. Your lot is 10,916 and required is 15,000. So it's non-conforming as to area non-conforming as to Speaker 26: Depth is above. Speaker 1: Yeah, 125 required 110 existing. And those are the only, only
two nonconformities? Speaker 26: Yes. Speaker 1: Except for one of the front yards, which will be brought into conformity into Speaker 26: Conformity with raising that structure. Speaker 1: I think I had a question about the fact that it's a corner lot and how we calculated the height on this one. We're always looking for confirmation that the applicant has thoroughly read our bylaws and notice the difference between a regular lot and a corn lot corner lot. Can you show us how the building height was calculated? Speaker 26: I know the building height, the 33 feet, eight inches is from the architectural plans. I myself, I did not prepare this plan.
I'm filling in, I have some questions regarding the establishment of the elevations as well. Speaker 1: Alright. I think what we need to see would be a statement from your surveyor or Yes, some qualified engineer. You know, basically confirming that the height of the building is based on what's required with the Navy zoning bylaws, which is a, using the a, what is it, the average or the center line of the two Speaker 27: Average center line Speaker 2: Of the two Speaker 26: Streets on Westlake and Irving. Correct. Speaker 1: Right. And you can't just use the perimeter around the foundation Yes. In these cases. So we'd, we'd looking
for a confirmation for that Speaker 26: This evening. I'd be looking to continue that. And then Speaker 1: Because of that or anything else you're Speaker 26: Thinking 'cause of that. Speaker 1: Yeah. Let's see if there's anything else from the committee members comments or questions. Not there Speaker 2: Yet. Okay. Speaker 1: Anyone in the audience with any comments or questions about number two? Westlake, come on up and let us have your name and address. Speaker 27: Bill Thompson direct to butter at number four. Westlake. I actually have several as it pertains to our property. The, the proposed height of the building on a quarter lot,
I believe 34. 34 something at the, from the grade, which would be from the corner center line of Westlake and Irving. Speaker 1: I'm not sure exactly. I have a language here in the zoning bottle. I believe it's the center line of the two existing or the two intersecting roads. Okay. It is center line elevation. All right. So I don't think it's the corner, but it's sort of a okay. Measured perpendicular from either side. Speaker 27: Our property at the property line, there's an elevation change of anywhere from three
to five feet depending on where you are on the lot. So that's gonna put the elevation of that, that structure somewhere in the 40 foot range from our perspective, a little concerned on the, the height of that from how we look at it because Speaker 14: The lot is, is sloping down so you're sort of in a Speaker 27: Valley, there's a, there's a stone, there's an old stone. Speaker 26: I wouldn't call it a retainment wall, but there is sort of a, a rubble wall that, that breaks grades much more aggressively than you would normally expect. A like a three to one slope vegetated.
Speaker 27: Okay. Yeah, I, I, I guess I see that as a somewhat of a retaining wall. 'cause I, I think there's gonna be a lot of potential erosion from the building perspective with, you know, excavation equipment in there. That, that, that wall is not really, the integrity of that wall is pretty, pretty poor as it is now. A lot of it is crumbled, so don't worry about that, that stone wall encroaching on our property. I guess with that being said, I, I would propose that rock wall come out and a new retaining wall put in
to protect our property is one, lemme just check some of my notes here. Rainwater stormwater collection. I see there's a couple of cult tech systems. One in the back right corner of the property. If you're looking from the Wesley side and the other one's on the back left Irving side of the property. I'm concerned about that water on our side of the property as it is now. We get considerable amount of water that runs through our backyard and collects in our backyard during any sort of rainstorm. So I think if we direct all that water from that house
or half of the water, let's say to that back corner, I think we're gonna get a lot of extra infiltration and undoubtedly, you know, run into a potential water, you know, into our house issue. So it's very concerning to us as it is now. I have to, you know, when it's a heavy rain, I have to get out and trench, you know, to try to redirect that water away from our house. You are on Westlake? Sorry to interrupt. I'm no before Westlake. Yep. Okay. Yep. Speaker 14: You can see the retaining wall if you look, you look at the, Speaker 27: Yeah, so I don't, I don't know what could be done as far as moving that, that that containment system that's in
that back corner by our property line, whether it can be moved to the other side of the property. But I'd propose, you know, at least that be moved away from our property to eliminate any extra water in our yard. Speaker 14: I'm trying to make sense of the topography of this lot. Are you changing the grade at all? Speaker 26: The contours in the front? It's the same exact top of foundation that the existing structure, the proposed structure is the same. There's a decent amount on the existing conditions on the left hand side of the sheet. Yep. There is a decent amount of grade change that occurs across the front of it.
And there is a retainment wall that is shown. I would say that it's not, it's not formal, it's not a mortar styled wall. It is really just a bunch of rubble and stones put together. But you know, the, the strength of that is such that, you know, interlocking, it's able to support itself at a steeper angle. You know about 45%. There are a bunch of trees along that lot line as well that add root strength that I, I don't see any way of removing that wall and maintaining any of those trees. Some of them I think vary between 18, 18
to 12 inches in diameter. So I do think the slope is stable with the vegetation that's intact. It's mature. I'll also comment about the storm water. When those are installed, there's a certain amount of embedment that occurs. The bottom of that unit would be lower than the grade of the front of your yard. So it would be introducing groundwater at an elevation lower than your front. So it's going to infiltrate lower than your foundation. It wouldn't be going into your yard at all. Speaker 27: What happens in the winter when the ground,
when the ground's frozen and we get a foot of snow on a roof that melts on a warm day and that water collects, it has no seepage drainage. Correct Speaker 26: On the surf the yard currently would any snow melt would, would collect and, and travel along its current grading. The unit's gonna be so far is gonna be down deep enough though that frost will not affect that. But I don't think much water's gonna go in there. 'cause you know, you're right, the gutters would be frozen so the storm water's not gonna be going in there, but it wasn't going to be going in there anyway. Speaker 1: Right. I think the way I look at it today, there is no infiltration today.
Every drop of water that hits this property either goes into the ground or runs off to some other property. Speaker 26: And that is Speaker 27: Mostly, yeah, the Speaker 26: Roof is not that far off in terms of the size of the proposed building compared to the existing structure. Yeah. Speaker 1: There's there's not a lot of increase in impervious one, so there won't be much of an increase at all in runoff. And number two, they're taking all of the runoff, I think from the entire roof. Correct? Correct. And putting that into these infiltration systems which are below ground, below the frost line. And so they will always function, you know, summer or winter. So I, I can't conceive a possibility
where your drainage doesn't get much, much better Speaker 26: And it's split in half as well. I'd add as well. Yeah. The fact that several of the leaders are leading towards Irving. Yeah. That's gonna take that half of the structure. Whereas I, I I, without knowing exactly the, the layout of the existing structure, it's hard to pattern out. But I would say probably a 70 30 split, most of it was heading, you know, down Westlake. That's what great is changing on this property. Sorry. Whereas this is gonna take half of that. And what happens when, if these systems become overwhelmed and there's no reason to think so there's very good soils in this area of Natick,
but if it does get overwhelmed from clogging lack of maintenance, there is a scupper overflow that pops up, the water flows out of that and bleeds off through the surface into regular street drainage, that water gets redirected to Irving and then down Westlake road as opposed to going through the back of your property. Speaker 27: So, so even that, that containment system that's in the back right corner by our property line, that that's also being redirected, that scupper is being re redirected down Westlake road? Speaker 26: Or is that just not that one, but I'm saying half of the struc, only half the structure now is gonna be going that direction
and it's being infiltrated at a depth that's lower than the front elevation of your house. So it it's lower. It wouldn't, it wouldn't, it wouldn't break daylight until it went to your front of your house, which is beyond your foundation. Speaker 27: Do we have a depth of that, that proposed infiltration? Speaker 26: You're gonna be down around Elevation 200 with the, with the proposed units. Speaker 27: In layman's terms, how, how far below grade is, Speaker 26: Oh, I'm sorry. A total length of about four feet. You gimme more than four feet. Four and a half. 'cause the, the bottom of the stone.
Speaker 27: Okay, that's, that's probably right about equal to Speaker 26: Grade. I have the grades. I I do know the grade in the front of your house is, is elevation 200. Speaker 27: Okay. I don't know what that means to me, but I just know if I stand in my yard, you know, at four and a half feet there's ground level on, on that property. So if we are borderline at four and a half feet, I'm just worried about there being some infiltration into our yard out of that system. Speaker 26: I, I would say, I would say you're three feet from the back, back rear left of your corner to the proposed
Speaker 27: S of the back Speaker 26: Of the Speaker 27: Property, the corner. But, but there is, there's, there's points on that yard somewhere like middle I would say of the, of the property front to back. It's probably more like four and a half feet. Speaker 26: The unit's going to be in the rear of, of the proposed house. Speaker 27: Right. But isn't it leaching out? Speaker 26: It leches downwards really? It's not a, it's not a lateral flow unless it hits something impervious and we have good clean sands and gravels. Speaker 27: Okay. But what happens in the event of that overflow and the scupper releasing all that water that's not going down, it Speaker 26: Would be a very large storm event,
in which case there would be far greater things failing in a municipal sense that than this drainage system. I believe the a hundred year event is an event that around eight and a half inches in a 24 hour period of time, that's a tremendous amount of water. That pattern they'd be flooding at a, at a regional basis all over the place. Speaker 27: Okay. So as, as far as it getting back to the, the rock wall that's currently there that has little to no integrity. Agree you say there there's some root structure that might,
Speaker 26: There are very, very mature trees. There's 18, you know, that's a foot and a half to to to one, one foot, two to one foot, to one and a half foot diameter trees. Those have been there for a long time and they're hardwoods. These are not pines. Speaker 27: Yeah, yeah, of course. Yeah. But that adds Speaker 26: A decent amount. The structure of something like that spreads out and, and, and holds the soil intact. There would be no way to remove the wall without removing all of those trees. Are the trees growing in the rip wrap? Right. Speaker 27: They're like built into the wall pretty much. Yeah. Like the wall, I Speaker 26: Would not call it a retainment wall Speaker 27: Either.
They, they destroyed the wall over time probably. So Speaker 7: It's a pile of rocks around a bunch of trees. Speaker 27: Yeah. In what used to be a, a wall is now like just a, a, a pile of rock. Exactly. Speaker 26: But it is grass. There is soil mixed in. It's not just stone, but there's enough angular material in there that adds a certain amount of strength that the soil's not, it's, it's not a, a progressive slope failure. Speaker 7: Is there a con what's the concern? I guess Speaker 27: Just the concern the, the integrity of that wall that, you know, during the, you know, the demolition and the construction of the new property, that a lot of
that stone is going to collapse and damage our fence. That's just on the other side of that, that wall. So, so that's a concern for me is, you know, destruction of the property, the, the fence. Speaker 1: Mr. Beamus, do you wanna talk about how you're gonna put probably some construction fence and obviously stormwater erosion? Yes. Sedimentation control to basically create a, a limit of work. Speaker 26: There's proposed controls and they're gonna stay away from those trees as well. 'cause they do not want to undermine the integrity of those trees that the trees then fall down on either your house or the house that they're going to construct.
Speaker 1: Can you give the app the abutter some assurance that you're not going to be touching the wall or disturbing it at all? Speaker 26: There would be no way to go there without removing your fence and without getting your permission to be on your property. I don't see any other way to remove that. Speaker 27: I'd be okay with giving you approval to come on my property, remove my fence, and build that wall. Speaker 26: We will be continuing, I, I I believe we will be asking to continue this hearing. I will bring that back and, and see if, if there isn't a different way perhaps Speaker 14: Future, if that will collapses and damages done to your property. I think it's pretty evident that it would be
on the developer to repair any damage that happens. Okay. You know, what happens 20 years down the road? I don't know, I don't see this wall, I don't know the integrity of it, but I'm gonna guess it was sort of fall in the same category of, you know, the, the owner of that wall would be liable to doing repairs of any damages that were done. My question is, is, you know, is a pile of rock with ground and trees
and soil, is that a good solid barrier? Even more solid than a retaining wall? You know, I just, I don't know from an engineering standpoint, but once you start getting trees, growing in, their trees tend to be good, good structural material basically. Speaker 1: Okay. Do you have any other questions? Speaker 27: Yeah, last, last concern would just be a, a privacy factor because of the, the height change from, you know, our backyard and the property being so close to each other
that, you know, even my six foot fence that I currently have there now next to that wall, other than it just containing my dog, gives zero privacy. You know, and the former occupant of that home was just a single older woman that, you know, didn't use the backyard. I, I would suspect that the, the new homeowners will have children, families doing a lot of barbecuing, a lot of playing in the backyard. I can see a lot of, you know, toys and everything else. You know, it, it's literally, you know, every time I'm in the backyard it's, Hey, how you doing?
Good. You know, it could be good, could be bad. So I, I, you know, I'd like to, you know, see some sort of privacy fence put up to help, you know, just, you know, separate the properties a little bit. Speaker 14: So I'm seeing a bunch of trees on Google Earth. Do they provide, at least in the summertime adequate Speaker 27: Screen, there's there, and that might be an older Google. There, there was some sort of shrubbery towards the back part of the property that did provide a bit of a, a, a, a barrier that not too long ago was thinned out considerably.
So there's very little bit of foliage there now for coverage. And then, you know, the larger trees that are, that we talked about is part of that rock wall. Yeah. Provide no foliage at a, you know, at a low level. Speaker 14: And he's limited, there's a five foot limit to what fences can be for height in Natick. Six foot six. Six, right. Oh six. Yeah. Six foot. And is that good thing on the zoning board, is that of adequate privacy? Speaker 27: If it was a six foot fence on their elevation Speaker 14: Property, it would've to be on their
Speaker 27: Property? Most certainly. Yeah. Like I said, my six foot fence does nothing. Does Speaker 14: There be able to be, they would be up as well, like above the rock. Speaker 27: Yeah. Yeah. The six foot fence would be on top of the, the rock. Exactly. So it would provide, you know, considerable, you know, more privacy for us and, and for the, the, the new occupants of that home as well. You know, they don't wanna, you know, see our business every day too, you know, from out my tidy whitey's in the backyard, you know, running around with the dog. I don't know if the kids wanna see that, you know, so Speaker 14: We Speaker 27: Don't, Speaker 14: We don't even want to hear about it.
Speaker 1: So, Speaker 27: You know, it, it, it's a win-win for, for, for all parties. The jurisdiction. Lord. Speaker 1: Do you, do you mention that you've got a fence on your line right now? Correct. Speaker 27: But Speaker 1: Is it sick? Speaker 27: It's just to contain my dog. Yeah. It's, it's just a six foot fence along that rock wall. Yeah. And at, at some points there's maybe a foot and a half a fence above their, their property line. Right? They, I mean they're grade is that a Speaker 1: Stock is the Speaker 14: Bottom of the Speaker 27: Slope. Stock eight. Yep. Speaker 1: Okay. Bottom of the slope. The Speaker 26: Bottom, his fence runs along the bottom of the slope. It doesn't have the benefit of the grade change. Speaker 1: So I wonder if you, as if we're planning on continuing anyway,
you might consider either a fence or some other vegetated buffer, right? If that would Speaker 27: Work. Yeah, we'd be, we'd be open to, you know, okay. Our provide or, you know, some sort of yeah. Hedge wall of sorts just to provide privacy in, in the backyard portion of the property mostly so that, you know, when we were in our backyard, they're in their backyard. It's not, you know, they can step over the fence if they wanted to type of thing. Speaker 1: Well, it sounds like they, they would consider that and maybe bring back a proposal next month. Yeah, Speaker 26: There's nothing proposed like that right now, but I, I, I would, they would consider it. Okay. Okay.
Speaker 27: Very good. Thank Speaker 1: You. Thank you. Anyone else in the audience for number two? Westlake Couple? Yes. Speaker 20: Hi, Victoria Grafflin, 45 Westlake Road. So I guess I have a question. First is the tree that you're proposing to remove the large oak tree at the front of the property that's currently sort of at the corner of Westlake and Irving? Speaker 26: There's, I think I, I have four different trees at the corner of Westlake and Irving. I can't remember if that was because they're sort of bifurcated at the bases or if that, if they're singles, the tree being proposed
to be removed is in the proposed driveway. It's a 36 inch diameter tree. It's on Irving Road. It's not at the corner of Irving and Westlake. Speaker 20: Okay, well having a trouble picturing exact there are, Speaker 26: I have it on this if you'd like come, come take a look. Yeah, lemme Speaker 28: Just take the quick look. Speaker 26: That's the corner. The sidewalk is running along the front. Yeah, that's the proposed tree. Speaker 20: Yeah, I think that may be the one I'm talking about. So I think Speaker 28: It is Victoria, the one that you sent the picture of. Yeah, it's not about the four branches on the corner. Speaker 20: Yeah, it kind of goes like that. Yeah. Speaker 28: It's the one that's sort of a single Speaker 20: From.
Yeah. So I guess my concern again, trees, you know, living on Westlake for the past 13 years, I've seen just, you know, the mature tree cover go down and go down and you know, we're beginning to look a little bit like Texas there instead of New England because we just don't have a lot of shade left. And this is a very significant oak tree. And it's a real, I mean it's a, it's like an anchor of the visual landscape of that top part of Westlake Road.
And again, being an oak being a very mature oak, it's significant in terms of wildlife habitat. You know, I I also think just generally we call ourselves the Natick redhawks and we're just losing all the tall enough trees for the hawks and other birds of prey to even, you know, hunt from. So if there's any way at all, you can move the driveway or redesign. It's just, you know, it doesn't look like it's a disease tree in any way. And I would hope that the board would also take into consideration those kinds of things
that are really significant features of a neighborhood and how it impacts the neighborhood and the community at large. And that's my comment. Thanks. Thank Speaker 29: You. Speaker 1: Anyone? Yes ma'am. Speaker 29: I'm Peg Brockel. I live at five Irving Road. So my house is directly at the top of Westlake Road and two Westlake then is, I look right down Westfield Westlake Road two is sort of kitty corner right on the corner between Irving and Westlake. I, I wanna echo the trees. I know you've heard a lot about it, but Campanelli in 1950 planted most of those.
And unfortunately a lot of the new homeowners, not necessarily, certainly developers are removing trees, but many of the new homeowners are coming in after they've purchased properties and then those trees are then being torn down because of leaves, et cetera. So echo that in the previous speakers that I've be concerned to try and keep as as many as possible. The other concern I would have is, which I understand you'll be doing at the next hearing, will be following up on the height of the property. Our house is, is still a ranch we put an addition on, but we stayed one level so we went into our backyard 'cause we have a good size lot as I stand in my,
I am up up the hill, so I have some elevation to that property. Whereas Bill is down the hill from the property next door to him. If I look out my bay window now I have a whole horizon with the exception of peripheral two story homes. Is this a three story house that's being proposed there? Speaker 1: No, Speaker 26: No, Speaker 1: No. Speaker 29: Half two story with the roof. Two and a half. Yeah. And is it all frontal to Westlake Road? I'm sorry, I haven't seen the plan. So I was hoping I'd get a handout like we did with a previous developer that would help me
articulate my concerns. Speaker 26: The front of the structure faces Westlake Road, the driveway will come in off of Irving, Speaker 29: Off of Irving. So the garage will face Irving or Westlake. The Speaker 26: Garage will face Irving Speaker 29: Will, the garage will face Irving, the frontage frontages in Westlake. As I look there, depending on the height, I just, I urge you to really take that into consideration and perhaps maybe make a site visit to that little corner neighborhood so you can see the grading like to Bill's house and like where we are up the hill. Because I have concern then when I look out my front window,
I'll be able to see down Westlake the sky and I'll be able to look right. But I'm not sure what I'm gonna see now when I look left. And I appreciate the fact that the developer has purchased the property and wants to sell it to a, hopefully a lovely family to for our neighborhood. But it's, these are very big houses that are now being built in our neighborhood where most many of us still do live in single, single story homes and want to keep them that way. Thanks. Speaker 1: Thank you. Yeah. Anything else? Oh, got another audience member. Just waiting until the end for the final comments.
Speaker 9: My name is Jim Cody. I live at 14 Bradford Road, which is just a block down the street. So I am in abut of a home that was on a corner and they built a, a large, you call them two and a half story, I call them three because they're quite tall because the grade difference and it looms over my ranch. And that's what's gonna happen with this proposed house to Bill. And even from PEGS perspective, looking over, it's gonna be a two and a half story. But a question for Mr. BEUs, is that third Ford
to be finished or a bowl? Speaker 26: I do not know. Okay. Speaker 9: Is there a basement proposed for this property Speaker 26: In the architectural set? There is, yeah. Speaker 9: Have they already gotten approval from Mr. Chairman? Is, is a basement been approved? Have they done the water level tests? Speaker 1: That would be from the Board of Health. And we have a letter here saying that they're proposing a full basement soil test must be conducted. So they have not done that yet, it sounds like. Speaker 9: So my concern again is the height of the house that it's just going to at the corner there
with people coming up to the stop sign coming up Westlake to Irving. Your line of sight is going to be partially obscured with this. And it's going to be the only colonial two and a half story single family house at that corner. And we've seen an awful lot of these. I've lived in the neighborhood since 1996 and especially the corner lots, the Abutters like myself take a beating when these developers come in for a profit and ruin our privacy, as Bill was alluding to, I have zero privacy in my backyard.
They put a, a wall and a fence and their first floor still looks out over my yard. So I have, I echo bill's concerns and Peggy's concerns that I would like to see. My suggestion is to drop the height of the house if you're gonna have a basement, finish the basement, but make it a hip roof like the same developer did down at one Liberty, he changed it, the neighbors had concerns and he changed it to a hip roof design. So it's just strictly attic. It can never be finished. That's what I would propose. Speaker 1: Thank you.
Any more comments, questions, thoughts? Speaker 7: No move to continue to demand, right? Speaker 1: We've gotta continue it anyway. Do we want to give them any guidance on the building size or building height? Obviously the height's gonna change. I think based on the measurement from the center. Speaker 7: The height's gonna have to go down by three or four feet when Speaker 1: They measure it correctly from the center line. Speaker 7: Yeah. Just by my looking at it. Yeah. Which I think might address some of the concerns. Yeah. Speaker 1: So I think the, the issues we're continuing for are the height confirmation or
Speaker 26: Address the height. Speaker 1: Yes. And then discussion perhaps you wanna talk directly with the neighbors about potential buffer, vegetative buffer or fence in the back. Yes. And any other concerns that any of the residents had raised tonight that you heard that you might wanna address with them? And then we'll be back here folks on May 19th. May 19th. So I'm Speaker 14: In, in landscaping, this is a big ask, but just at least the initial con concept of a landscaping plan. I personally, Speaker 26: To see that on the plan. Speaker 14: Yeah, I mean a landscaping plan, you know,
somebody had raised the, the issue about the driveway and the trees and I think it's a good neighborly thing to do. Speaker 26: I'd like to take a crack at this. I I, like I said, I did not get to actually prepare any of this. I'd like to take a crack at this and see if that 36 inch tree couldn't be saved. Speaker 1: Great. Good. Okay. Speaker 14: Okay. Continue. May 19th. Speaker 1: Is there a second? All right. All those in favor of continuing. Thank you. See you again. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you folks. All right. 1, 2, 3 more to go, huh? Speaker 14: Yeah. Speaker 1: 79 speed street. Next Speaker 21: You make me feel loved Speaker 1: On
how fast you are not last. We have a public hearing for an application by Mota Realty. A finding is requested under 40 a section six four B five a. Applicant proposes to raise the existing structure and construct a new single family dwelling on the previous nonconforming lot shown the plan submitted. Mr. Mota? Speaker 21: No, my name is Paul Lia. I'm with Field Resources. We're the survey firm who prepared the plan that's before you. We have a gentleman from Mota Construction in the back. But as you may know, this site came before you earlier for a special permit with regard to potentially an office in the commercial portion
of the lot. As you see, this lot is divided with the zone line. So conveniently making everything much more clean and easy. The house that they're proposing is pretty modest considerably considering it the, there's the virtually no grading other than just, I mean I will say the, the contours didn't print very darkly on the hard copy that I have here. But basically, essentially they're keeping the grade as it is around the house there.
The amount of impervious reduces quite a bit on this site. There's already been test fits done. We will be doing a full basement, it's an eight foot pour. And, sorry. And you know, one of the things I think that it goes just to echo some of the things that have I've seen is questions on prior applications tonight. One of the things that's happened, not as a matter of bylaw in the town of Natick, but as a matter of the instructions that have been prepared since Claire came
to the Conservation Commission, there didn't used to be a clear defined this is what you need for a minor stormwater permit. This is what you need for a major stormwater permit. So that she and Bill sat down and I'm sure quite a few other parties at the town, not just the two of them. And came up with a very definitive list when that covers when and how we present what trees we want to do, what trees, how we're gonna remove them, how we're gonna protect the ones that we don't take down. And that's all very comprehensively covered in the
stormwater permit process. And so for, I know a number of the audience have been confused as to what, you know, the process is with and wonder why we're not addressing a lot of those here. And that's primarily why on our proposals and our submissions, we comply with the checklist to make sure we give you guys what we need to and what we should to help you guys get a good and thorough picture of these sites. Now that doesn't particularly pertain to this site.
It's a pretty denuded site. It's the, it's the old dress shop that is Bri Bridal bridal shop. So it's been, you know, it looks like a home, but it's been run like a business for many, many, many years. It has a parking lot to the right, basically two thirds of the property that will all be gone. There'll be a, there will be a driveway with a, a decent turnaround 'cause nobody wants to back out onto Speen Street. And as you can imagine, and it's pretty straightforward,
I mean as far as they go. Speaker 1: Okay, thank you. Speaker 21: Questions, comments from the Speaker 7: Question for you? Probably 'cause as the expert when we are doing this, we had, there's locating the, what was proposed to be a commercial building on the commercial part of the lot. And now you're doing a house on the, still on the commercial part. Speaker 4: On the residential side. What's that? They moved it to the other side. Speaker 21: We, yeah, mostly, mostly we initially, now the other question I had, Speaker 7: They've changed Speaker 21: Them this Yeah.
We resubmitted some old sets online. Oh we resubmitted due to comments that we were given by the, this is the flip set, the board, this is the flip set. Now I will say that was one question I had. I was hoping that Dave would be here to answer where, where a residential home can be built in the commercial zone. I'm not certain why that impetus there was because we, we actually think that's a better fit for the site, keeping the house basically. Not exactly where the old one was. But, but again, this works too. So that's fine.
I just as a matter of understanding the rules best if Dave felt that was important. Okay. I'd like to just understand why that's important. If that in fact is because my understanding with the bylaw was that the lesser impactful uses are allowed in the zones. If anybody has any answer to that, I would love to, Speaker 14: For my own clarity, what's being proposed is a residential structure, Speaker 21: Single family Speaker 14: Home in a commercial zone and Speaker 21: Then no, it's in a residential zone.
Tipping into a commercial zone. 'cause you're, Speaker 14: Am I looking at upside down or you looking Speaker 1: At the wrong one? Yeah, you Speaker 7: Look at the flip plan. Speaker 14: Where's the flip plan Speaker 7: Further down. Speaker 30: Okay. Speaker 21: Just so we can look at them. That's Speaker 7: A little bit bigger. Speaker 21: I Speaker 14: Will Oh I see, Speaker 21: Okay. Okay. My print out, the contours grayed out when I was Speaker 7: Trying to race over here, but Speaker 30: Yeah, that's a tough, tough. Speaker 7: So that's where this on the corner, the cat corner from this biz. Yeah, I remember that way back when. Speaker 30: Yep. And I think they put a house Speaker 7: There. Yeah. It was a pain to Speaker 30: Yeah. Speaker 7: To figure out. Speaker 30: Alright. It's a pain to figure out.
Okay, so what you've done is you move this so that the majority of the structure is in the residential zone. Correct? Some is in the commercial, the driveway's in the commercial. And, and what's the issue that we have to resolve on Speaker 14: This Speaker 21: That we're, Speaker 7: There may not be one, but I saw on the old plan the plan that I thought was the new plan. Right. But Speaker 14: Same one I was looking Speaker 7: At exactly and I saw the house commute completely in the commercial zone and I couldn't remember if that mattered
or why it mattered or how much it mattered. Speaker 14: And are we looking for a section six finding? Speaker 1: Yes. I think that's what the building commissioner told us. Speaker 14: Okay. Speaker 1: That they, this can be approved under a section six finding Speaker 14: That makes it easy. Speaker 1: And it looks like what a fairly smaller house compared to some we've seen, but Speaker 21: Yeah, it's not very Speaker 1: Average size. Speaker 17: What is the livable floor area of the house? Do you know? Speaker 21: The, when you, you talking about the living living space? Yes. That, I dunno that that I would, the arc
I would have to get from the architect, but I know the, as you can imagine, we've had several versions of this. So this is the same. Yeah. So we're at 14.6 on the lot coverage. Okay. Fourteens of 0.6 Speaker 2: 33. Okay. Around 33. Okay. Speaker 1: Peg, did we get any letters from board of health or engineering? Yes, Speaker 2: They're in there. Speaker 21: Oh, I'll look them up. Speaker 1: Not in my package Speaker 21: Now they, they haven't, the engineer hasn't resubmitted new stormwater, but we had already gone
through on the stormwater on the larger and you know, building the larger structure with the larger parking lot, that whole nine. So, and we know that worked. This is gonna work accidentally. Piece of cake is really, I mean nope. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. I was just checking to see if the board of health or engineering had recommended the infiltration system. Speaker 21: Oh, well we're definitely gonna do infiltration on site. Okay. They're gonna, I mean we're gonna have to go through major stormwater permit as a matter of the amount
of earth we move just to do the work. But if you consider this was the prior engineering site that we were infiltrating for and the site in the soils suited that amply to infiltrate for this smaller house would be Speaker 2: Okay. Yeah. Speaker 21: Nominal. Speaker 1: I'm good. Any other questions, comments on the board from the audience on this? Yes, please. Speaker 31: Hi, I am Susan Adler. I am at 2 2 6 Pond Street. So we're in a butter. I'm thrilled that it's gonna be a house and not an office,
but it's, that's gonna take up the lot. It's not, you're gonna build a house and then stick an office on the other half of it. It's all house on the whole lot. That's it. It Speaker 21: Would be a, I mean it would be contrary to the bylaw to be able to do that. I mean, my understanding is there is no window left for that. Okay. Type of development. Speaker 31: And is this plan I have not seen a plan. I'm sorry, Speaker 21: It's a single family house with a two car side entry garage. I mean it's pretty, are they Speaker 31: Still thinking of taking out the same big trees that were against the fence? There were a couple of big trees.
Speaker 21: You mean along the back? Yes. No, no, Speaker 31: The trees are gonna stay. Speaker 21: Well is the trees that are to the back left as, as you're looking at it from speed. Speaker 31: Okay. Yes. I'm looking at it the opposite way from from your home. Yeah. Yeah. I think that that would Speaker 21: Be, yeah, no, that, that area isn't, I mean it doesn't appear that those would be in any way in the scope of construction because the house has been moved up into where the parking lot is now. I probably, I don't know, I shouldn't be really, but, and really it's been kind of sucked up more into the residential zone and away from the intersection.
And now the only downside I see for my clients is they'll probably have to do something along that back right side where they are to protect them from all that landscaping equipment that's on the property next door. The landscaping company that has the whole parking area in the back. Speaker 31: Oh, I think it's a roofing company or something. Oh, Speaker 21: I thought yeah, look like landscaping, roof, roofing, landscaping, whatever. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 21: Well see. But yeah, that's, I mean really I don't think there's much in the way of vegetation removal at all in the project. Speaker 31: I'm happy to hear that. That's it. Thank Speaker 1: You. All right. Thank you. Anyone else in the audience on 79 bean
comments, questions, thoughts, motions? Speaker 14: I'm not sure what exactly. I think it's pretty what I'm recommending. I know I always get confused with these. Speaker 1: They're asking for a section six finding that it's, what they're proposing is not substantially more detrimental to the neighborhood than the previous non-conforming uses instruction provided spill. Speaker 14: Does anybody second that? Speaker 1: I don't wanna put words in your, what's the quick Speaker 14: Move that we approve the application for a residential dwelling 79 speed street. Seeing as it is not substantially more detrimental than the existing structure on 79 Speed Street
and it sub subject to being built in accordance substantially in accordance with the plans submitted and in compliance with the letters submitted from the town offices. Speaker 1: Good. Ari seconded. Second. All those in favor? Five o. Great Congrat. Thanks. Do Speaker 21: The easy ones early. Speaker 1: Moving right along to 21 Strawberry Hill Road. We have an application from Brian Fair for a finding under master law 48, section six and native zoning. The applicant proposes to build an addition to the right side of the house to include a garage
and master suite on a pre-existing non-conforming a lot. This is our first mere addition this evening. I feel so insignificant now. Speaker 14: I Speaker 1: I'm not Brian Fair. I'm Scott Holcomb, the general contractor for Brian Fair. And unfortunately the time here has outlived my phone battery so I do not have anything here to show you. However, I am pretty well versed in what the project is and basically what we're looking for is the house is like basically a,
a degree off of the street. So it has a slight angle to it. The left side of the house starts in a conforming 30 plus feet. And then about a third of the way through where the porch is, it gets to 29 feet. And the edge of the existing house is also 29 feet. But with the proposed two car garage with bedroom above that corner will end up being at 28 feet. So it's part of it is conforming, but part of the house is not conforming already and we're just looking for that extra foot
of relief into the corner of the home. Currently the house has a 14% lock coverage. This would bring it up to 17%. There's a 20% max on the home. The height of the house will not change from the current. Basically what we're doing is there'll be the house gable end on the addition will face the street. But the but the main house, you do not see the gable end. You see the roof. So you'll now see a gable end where the garage will be. So height doesn't change, it's just really just looking for that one foot extra of relief as the house kind
of comes towards the street 'cause of that slight offset. It's not quite parallel with the street. Speaker 7: Well as it turns out you're lucky. Speaker 1: Pardon? Speaker 7: You're lucky it did do that. 'cause you already have a preexisting Speaker 1: Well I I I've been for the board before and I, and I, I learned very quickly that if it's not, if it's already conforming, you're not getting it. So this, we're crossing our fingers that we're already not conforming in that aspect and just looking for that little, little extra relief there. Yeah. Speaker 7: And you're missing lot area and lot frontage. Speaker 1: Yes. By, by today's Yeah. I believe the, the lot's like 15 and some change. So Speaker 7: It's it's the same one Oh.
As this garage. Gotcha. Speaker 1: This is the garage. Speaker 7: Yeah, Speaker 1: But we meet the, the side setbacks, rear setbacks. It's, it's the front. We made the, the coverages, but yes, you're correct. The lots, the lot by today's standard is smaller than, than the, than the two 20,000 Speaker 7: You'd be here anyway. Speaker 1: Yeah. With an undersized lot. Right. So just to run down the numbers quick. For a residential zone C 20,000 square feet area required, you have 11,816. So that makes it nonconforming right off the bat. Yep. 120.
For lot frontage you have only 88.3. So that is also nonconforming lot depth is may or may not be conforming, I guess with the angle impact. Yeah, it kind of takes a, an angle. I don't know how they tell you to measure that. I haven't checked that recently. But front yard setback, as you said is existing 29 where thirties required and you're asking for another foot to 28 side yard required 12 existing 25 proposed 13. The other side is 1228 existing 28 proposed.
You're not changing that. You're not changing the rear and you're not changing, well you're changing the billing coverage from 14 to 17.6, which is under the 20% limit. And then the height again doesn't change, it's just an addition. Correct. Matching the same roof line I guess, or same, same exact roof line just just goes perpendicular to the existing. Okay. I have no real questions on this except let me check and see if the board of health requires you to do infiltration. Do you know I haven't seen that on, on the portal yet.
I don't know if they've commented on it. Okay. Do not follow exceed will not exceed the threshold for a minor stormwater permit and does not fall within a PD or afer recharge area. However, due to the increased impervious area, the applicant may still want to provide an appropriately sized stormwater filtration facility to mitigate increased runoff. Speaker 14: Conservation says the same, Speaker 1: Say again? Speaker 14: Conservation says the same. Yeah, it's not, Speaker 1: Not requiring but recommending or suggesting, Speaker 14: But it looks like you're replacing a little sort of mudroom like thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so the house currently has little side, it was like a three season porch at one point, you know, over, over the years they've kind of made it somewhat livable space. But that will come down in, in lieu of the garage space. And then the back is a little sort of laundry area, little four foot deep, a pit stop sort of catwalk laundry area. And then the suite above it will be bedroom space as their growing family. So if they need to move out and get an extra bedroom, Speaker 14: There's currently a driveway, a garage
already in the house. Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a single, single car garage that's, I dunno if you've ever seen these houses, but they're, they're fairly useless by today's car standards on size. So that's, that'll be turned into two car, an office and then the two car, well actually it's only gonna be a one door garage and a, an oversized entrance or oversized single garage door Speaker 14: Side yard setback. So that's going from 25 to 13. That's where the big work is, correct? The side Speaker 1: Correct.
On the right side setback. Yes. On the right side of the home. Speaker 14: But you're really looking for relief on that. Speaker 1: Yeah, they imposed the sort of setback. Setback, sorry. You can kind of see how the house is just, it's just got that quite Yeah. One degree or so to keep the, the, the addition in a linear line. That's Speaker 14: The idea. This is section six. Speaker 1: Anyone in the audience tonight who wants to talk or question or We at 21 Strawberry Hill Road, nobody does. No. Speaker 14: Rob, I move that we approve the application
for 21 Strawberry Hill. I'm seeing as the addition is not substantially more detrimental than the existing current structure and provided it's built substantially in accordance to the plan submitted and subject to compliance with the letters submitted by the town. Speaker 1: Good second. I'll second Jeff. All those in favor? I vote. Thank you very much. Thank you. Speaker 14: One more. Speaker 1: One more. Eight Warren Road. Anyone here for eight? Warren Road? Eight Warren Road. LLC. Speaker 14: You're embarrassed. Speaker 32: Well, they're not gonna show up.
It would be nice for 'em to tell you. Speaker 1: Yeah. Oh, Speaker 14: You are here for eight Warren Road, Speaker 1: Abutters. It would've been nice. Oh no, Speaker 32: Just an item. Speaker 1: Wow. This is Ray's existing and construct a new, that's Speaker 4: Very surprising for this applicant. Speaker 1: Who is it? Eight Warren Road Life gets Speaker 32: In the order. Derek Speaker 4: Wheeler. Speaker 1: We've had him before. Yeah. Yeah. Speaker 4: That's why. Very surprising. Speaker 1: Well, I hope he is. Okay. Yeah. Maybe he didn't want me as chairman, wanted David back. I think if we don't have anything to proceed on and we're not willing to do it without the applicant before us, we can open the hearing
and then immediately continue. Otherwise, if we don't open it tonight, they'd have to re advertise. Yeah, Speaker 7: I would give 'em the benefit of the doubt and continue it. Yeah. If Speaker 1: That's okay. So let's, we open the hearing for eight Warren Road for a finding for SEC chapter 48, section six and native zoning bylaws. Is there a motion Speaker 7: Move to continue to May 19th? Speaker 1: Is there a second? All right, Alan, all us in favor and we Speaker 7: Can see democracy in action. Speaker 1: Sorry to keep you waiting for three hours. No, Speaker 14: It's, wow. Very sorry. Speaker 32: That's, Speaker 1: It's educational.
Speaker 32: If we, if you, you did open the meeting and then immediately voted to close, that's fine. Would it have been okay to take public comment at that Speaker 14: Point or not? I think so. We would've to reup that Speaker 32: Present. Speaker 1: We, you probably don't want to do that. We don't want to take any evidence tonight because the makeup of the board might change by next month. If one of us is on and one of us is off and fine, the applicant's not here. So it really isn't appropriate. But Speaker 32: No problem. Speaker 1: And you're welcome to submit email as well to p You can if you had comments. Speaker 32: Yeah, there are, I there will be some times next in the
next 45 days when I won't be available, so yeah. Okay. I can, Speaker 1: Yeah, either in person or emails or letters all will be considered. Speaker 32: Could I use this opportunity to ask a general question about drawings submitted by contractors? Sure. Okay. In the particular case, Speaker 1: If it doesn't take too long, 'cause this is a long meeting already. Thank Speaker 32: You. I just, no one knows more than him. Yeah. The, the site plan and this had previously come up in the 50 Pleasant Street fiasco.
The site plan shows St. Thomas Avenue as I would guess 40 feet wide and Warren Road as I would guess 25 or 30 feet wide. It turns out those are rights away. The actual width of those two roads is 19 feet at 60 feet respectively. And the drawing represents them as full width. So I'm wondering if that's correct practice, given that those are rights away that the town could serve versus reality if the town GIS reflects reality. Speaker 1: If, Speaker 32: And I have printed examples of this, Speaker 1: If I understand your question correctly, I, I mean we,
when we get plans, proposed plans for a proposed project Right. We wanna see both the property line, which is the right of way. Yep. And sometimes we wanna see the limit of pavement and the sidewalks and all the features that appear on the earth. Okay. Trees and walls and sidewalks and driveways and houses and sheds. So we'd want both. We'd want the right of way and the pavement. Okay. Oftentimes on the plans. On the plan. Showing. On the plans. Okay. Speaker 32: I, I did not notice, I should look again, but I did not notice in the site plan the actual payment delineation
Speaker 1: And, and in some cases it might not be relevant to what we're doing. Yeah. You know, like when we were just on Irving Street and Westlake, you know, we don't really care so much about where the edge of the pavement is. Right? Yeah. But if it was an issue with access or if an issue with traffic, congestion, parking, safety runoff, drainage, the condition of the road. Yes. If those things were relevant to our decision and the criteria that we're allowed to consider, we might very well want to see the pavement. Okay. Speaker 32: Without getting into the commentary itself,
I believe that it's Speaker 7: An issue of accessing Speaker 1: Okay. With Speaker 7: Respect to the placement of the driveway. Speaker 1: Fair enough. Thank Speaker 7: You. Speaker 1: Thank you. Is there any other business or Speaker 7: Motion to approve the minutes, guys? Motion to approve the minutes you sent us Speaker 1: Sort. Is there a second? Second Ari. All in favor? 1, 2, 3, 4. Speaker 7: Alright. Speaker 1: All against all abstaining standing. Okay. 4 0 1 4 0 1 approved. Speaker 7: Abstaining. You know, every time we get 1, 4, 0, 1. Yeah. Okay. I always struggle with what the issue is.
And then just a motion to adjourn. Speaker 1: Motion to adjourn. Speaker 7: Some move. Speaker 1: Jeff. Adam, Aaron.