The Zoning Board of Appeals spent an hour on Feb. 17 on a variance its applicant called trivial — two lots each about 281 square feet under the 25,000-square-foot minimum — and finished the night with no vote, a list of missing documents, and a public hearing it left open. The application, from 52 Mt Airy Rd, LLC, would split a 1.14-acre property at 52 Mount Airy Road into two lots of 24,718.50 and 24,718.60 square feet in the RA-25 district. Lot A keeps the existing house; Lot B would get a new one. Attorney Kory Salomone of Zarin & Steinmetz, for the applicant, ran the board through the five area-variance factors and landed on the third. "It's 1% variance. I'd respectfully submit that's not substantial," Read 4:05▶ Salomone said. Board member Doug Olcott declared a conflict of interest at the start of the meeting, recused himself and left the room before the hearing began.

The board went at the trees first

Chairman James Tuman told Salomone that the fourth factor — impact on physical and environmental conditions — had been glossed over. "I know we have a lot of neighbors here who seem to think there is an impact on the environment, and they've submitted letters," Read 5:30▶ Tuman said, and he wanted it addressed in detail, "not simply glass over that we're gonna take care of things." Read 6:01▶ Project engineer Michael Mastrogiacomo put the removal at 26 to 30 trees, needed to terrace the site, set the house and stabilize the slope holding up the existing residence. He said he had marked a few extra deliberately. "I've always found it better to be a little bit more conservative than to have to come back and say, hey. I didn't realize we had to take down more trees," Read 15:46▶ Mastrogiacomo said. A landscaping plan is being prepared — hollies and spruces rather than a row of arborvitae. "It's not like we're just taking down the trees and leaving it bare," Read 7:27▶ he said. Owner Andrew Cortese said replanting is the intent: "we understand we took down big trees. We're gonna install landscaping and maybe a little taller trees," Read 16:28▶ Cortese said. Tuman pushed on what counts. "What's your definition of a tree?" Read 28:47▶ he asked, looking at a neighbor's photograph. The engineer said the plans label anything from five inches in diameter up, and that much of what reads as a large trunk in a photograph is a cluster of three- and four-inch saplings. Asked from the table whether the village regulates that, the answer in the room was four inches on steep slopes, under a tree code the village recently updated — the board did not have the current code book to hand.

Grades, walls and a driveway

Board member Bill Goldsmith worked through the site's numbers. Existing grade at the street line, at the centre of the proposed driveway, is about elevation 238; the house site sits at about 250, and the engineer is holding the garage floor at 250 and working backwards from there. Goldsmith asked whether the two houses could share one driveway. Mastrogiacomo said the grade difference rules it out: "I'd be putting in walls in excess of 20 feet high. And I I don't think the neighbors will want us to see a 20 foot high retaining wall." Read 11:27▶ Retaining walls on the plan are held to four to six feet, likely segmental block or stone. Goldsmith also asked whether the cut-and-fill balance rested on any study. "Was that based on any kind of engineering or geotechnical study?" Read 12:30▶ he asked. It did not; the engineer offered to run a cut-and-fill analysis. No blasting is anticipated, and both houses would connect to the existing sewer by two private lines, retiring the existing septic system. On traffic, Tuman noted the board had received a document counting accidents on the road. "We've we've got one document in there that there's been 24 accidents on the street," Read 20:37▶ Tuman said. Mastrogiacomo said both driveways have 200 feet of sight distance each way and are set perpendicular to the road, and that no traffic study had been done: "Honestly, for a two lot subdivision, I've never done a traffic study." Read 21:26▶ Pressed on the steep slopes, the engineer said the steep-slope analysis normally comes at the Planning Board stage but agreed to prepare one: "I can prepare that and and show that." Read 18:44▶ He also acknowledged typographical errors in the setback table on sheet C-101 and said he would correct them.

Three neighbors, and 45 signatures

Tuman opened the public hearing and nobody spoke for the application. Claire Hilbert of 60 Mount Airy Road read a letter from Stuart and Karen Greenbaum of 48 Mount Airy Road South, who were out of state. Their house, the letter said, "was built in 1838 upon a rock formation appropriate for that time," Read 34:50▶ and external vibrations already rattle its doors and dishes. Removing the embedded stone formation the new driveway would need "would require hand or explosive demolition," Read 34:50▶ the letter said, and would destabilise the 1838 foundation. On the driveway's position at the end of a hairpin turn, the letter was blunt: "The location on this proposed driveway is an accident waiting to happen." Read 37:08▶ Speaking for herself afterwards, Hilbert said she did not know how many trees had already gone. "I don't know what number of trees have already been removed, but that's a concern that's crossing my mind is the extensive habitat, destruction," Read 44:57▶ Hilbert said. She had heard, she said, of developers who "take the trees down and then oops, sorry, it's done." Read 46:12▶ After twenty-two years on the road, she said the change "would be heartbreaking for myself and many longtime residents." Read 46:03▶ David Steele of 56 Mount Airy Road, whose property abuts the site, said the count on the table understates what is happening. "there's already been over 25 very large, probably a 100 year old trees taken down. So this is kind of death by a thousand cuts," Read 47:59▶ Steele said. "We're talking about up to 60 trees because half of them have already been removed." Read 47:59▶ His own house dates to 1790. Mount Airy Road, he said, "It's rustic. It's not a subdivision. It's not suburbia." Read 47:59▶ Steele also objected to the calendar. About 20 neighbors came to the first hearing, he said, which was moved at the applicant's request; the new date landed in a school vacation week. "This date is a school vacation week, and nearly all of our neighbors are unable to be here because they're away on vacation," Read 47:17▶ Steele said. Deborah Schupack of 16 King Street read a letter she said carried 45 signatures from King Street, Mount Airy and the trails, "because it has the weight of 45 signatures behind it." Read 50:27▶ The letter put the objection in hydrological terms: "Root systems provide essential structural support that reduces erosion and the likelihood of mudslides," Read 52:24▶ it said, and King Street residents have documented flooding and video of runoff during heavy rain from before the clearing at 52 Mount Airy began. The opposition, it said, "is also about protecting people, homes, and village infrastructure from very real risks of flooding, erosion, and mudslides." Read 50:27▶ Its closing line: "Decisions made uphill have serious downhill consequences." Read 55:42▶

What happens next

No determination was made. According to the meeting's draft minutes, the board asked for an updated survey showing existing and proposed conditions, a steep-slope analysis, architectural elevations and renderings of the proposed house including its height, and clarification of the grading and retaining-wall details. "We're gonna keep the public, hearing open, and we're gonna try to get a site visit in in the next couple weeks," Read 57:40▶ Tuman said — weather permitting, once the snow is off the ground. Before that visit the applicant will ribbon every tree proposed for removal and stake the driveway centreline and the house location, so the board can walk what it has been looking at on paper. Residents who could not make the February date can speak when the hearing resumes.