Groton Open Space Association

OPDS Provides Further Details On Reg Rewrite

GROTON — The Office of Planning and Development Services has provided additional details of its planned rewrite of Groton’s land-use rules, characterizing them as a way to combine the preservation of open space with subdivision development.

Members of the planning and zoning commissions discussed the suggested changes at a workshop March 9, 2010, at the Town Hall Annex. Planning Director Michael J. Murphy and Planning Manager Matthew Davis led the proceedings. Several members of the Inland Wetlands Agency attended as part of the audience.

Topics included:

–natural resource “protection levels”

–the amount of developable land left in Groton

–subjectivity vs objectivity in the subdivision approval process

–how to incentivize builders to favor open space subdivisions

Reaction was interested though cautious. Zoning Commission Chairman Stephen Hudecek expressed concern that the proposed changes could promote development of lands that under existing regulations would remain unbuilt.

Planning Commission Chairman James Sherrard said that proposed formula-based calculations of dwellings to be permitted on a given lot could encourage charges of “takings” from developers who were denied their full formula quotas.

Zoning Commission member Douglas Brandt wondered if the subdivision-based open space saving would create a “checkerboard” that doesn’t provide for contiguous open space.

Planning Commission member Ray Munn praised the OPDS for “moxie” in introducing the proposals and said they may well pay off. The proposals grew out of a contract the town signed in March 2008 with Kendig Keast Collaborative, a midwest-based municipal planning consultant.

The “protection levels” currently proposed by the OPDS are mostly in line with those discussed at a similar workshop March 4, 2009, though the protection level has been raised for moderate slopes (15%-24.9%). At the 2009 workshop, no protection factor was proposed for moderate slopes outside the state-mandated sewer avoidance area. Within the SAA at that time, moderate slopes would have had a 100% protection factor. Under the latest proposal, moderate slopes inside the SAA would continue to be factored at 100%, with moderate slopes outside the SAA being rated at 65% protection.

Other protection levels are as follows: Wetlands and 100-year floodplains 100%; Waterbodies and watercourses 100% outside the Water Resource Protection District and 120% inside the WRPD; steep slopes (25%+) 100%; and woodlands 20% in RU districts and 10% in R/RS/and MF zones. The OPDS material didn’t deal with protection outside the RU, R, RS and MF zones.

Protection levels would not directly protect resources. They represent factors in a formula for calculating the maximum number of residential units that would be allowed on a given tract of land. For example, any acreage ranking as a steep slope would be discounted by 100% in computing maximum numbers of units on a tract. However, the protection level would not ban building on steep slopes.

Mr. Sherrard said he worried that developers might complain if they weren’t granted the total number of units that are indicated by the KKC-style formulas. Mr. Murphy and Mr. Davis said that the total number was only a starting point, which could be reduced in other processes such as Inland Wetlands Agency hearings. The OPDS has repeatedly stressed the need for objective development standards that can be defended in courts. Without a number, Mr. Murphy said, “It becomes too subjective.” Mr. Davis said, “It’s defensible because it’s consistent.”

Mr. Hudecek said, “I’m seeing words such as ‘maximizing the yield’ and I am kind of uncomfortable with that because we are not trying to jam in the maximum number of houses that we can by skewing the rules a little bit. We’re trying to make a fair assessment of [constraints] and then lower even further the number of units.” He also said, “I hope we’re not doing zoning changes for the sake of building on land that normally would not be built up.”

Mr. Davis said that numbers of units allowed would be within existing standards for each zone. It has appeared, however, that the new rules could allow far higher numbers of units than would be likely under current rules. For example, the Sheep Farm, a 65-acre parcel on which GOSA has a purchase option, apparently could qualify for a maximum number of 106 units under proposed protection levels. That contrasts with some 34 units proposed by the builder of the Groton High Point subdivision that once was planned for the site. (This unofficial 106-unit figure is much higher than the 79 units estimated by KKC in March 2009 because the net yield factor has been increased to 2.9 from the 1.89 used then.)

In reply to a GOSA question about this, Mr. Davis said that if the amount of open space foreseen in the original development could be held at the original 60% and “the yield factor resulted in 90 or even 120 units for this site, based on the POCD, those potential yields would still be consistent.”

The OPDS presentation stressed what it said was the limited extent of further development opportunities in the Town of Groton. It said 1998 figures showed some 3,090 acres of “effective developable land” in residential zones. Much of this land, it said, is located in sewer avoidance areas. It said that developers must be given strong incentives to choose to build conservation developments in the non-sewered areas rather than conventional subdivisions with large-lot single family detached homes, which it said are not environmentally friendly.

The OPDS also said it has succeeded in exacting large amounts of open space from developers — well in excess of what regulations require — as part of the subdivision process. In another context, the OPDS said that 473 acres in 56 parcels have been saved in the subdivision process since 1991. “We’ve been getting substantial [open space] dedications but we want still more,” Mr. Murphy said. Mr. Davis said that open space exactions have been impressive, but they have been done on an ad hoc basis, rather than a regulatory basis.

Mr. Murphy said open space and subdivision development can go together even though it may sound “counterintuitive.”

Mr. Davis and Mr. Murphy said they would like to build a “hierarchy” of subdivision models, topped by the “aggressive” open space model, which could protect up to 65% open space. To do this, builders might have to be incentivized by having flexibility in building types (e.g. manor houses containing three or four units) and yield adjustments. The OPDS plans to work on regulatory language for a new open space conservation subdivision that, among other things, would prescribe a minimum of 30% open space, up from 20% at present.

The OPDS answered Dr. Brandt’s question about how to avoid a “checkerboard” of scattered green areas by saying that the subdivision process is a good way to get linkages among open spaces.

Not dealt with in the discussion is how to provide long-term protection to open space that is preserved by cluster housing. Without protections such as in-perpetuity conservation easements, these lands would appear vulnerable to development under future resubdivisions. Nor was there any substantial talk about purchasing existing open space outright, such as occurred following the 1988 Town of Groton open space bond issue.