HomeMy WebLinkAbout1979-04-03 4
GROTON TOWN PLANNING BOARD MEETING
Held in the Town . Hall
Groton , N . Y .
Tuesday - April 3 , 1979 on 8 : 00 P .M .
PRESENT : R . Gleason - Chairman*
J . MacNeil*
L . Raymond*
M . Adams* G . Evans - Tompkins County
D . Payne Planning Board
C . Twigg
G . Totman J . Bell - Recording Clerk
* - Denotes those present .
R . Gleason : We ' ll start the meeting now and get the minutes out of the way .
One thing I didn ' t put on the Agenda , we have to have election
of officers tonight .
J . MacNeil : That ' s new business .
R . Gleason : Are there any additions or corrections to the minutes of our last
meeting ?
L . Raymond : I have a question since I wasn ' t here . The cost factor that was
given for the extension of the road along the former railroad - -
I don ' t doubt his estimate but I don ' t get an indication from
the minutes of what kind of a road they were talking about for
that price .
R . Gleason : He didn ' t say but I assume a town road . I thought it was a little
bit high myself .
L . Raymond : If I thought it would be useful I wouldn ' t mind getting a second
estimate from my superintendent .
R . Gleason : You may want- to know there will be a public hearing on the 30th of
April on what to do with the Lehigh Valley right - of-way .
L . Raymond : Oh , boy , - - I can ' t be here , - - I have to go to Watertown . If I had
known that yesterday I might not have committed myself to Water -
town .
R . Gleason : Are there any other comments or corrections to the minutes ? I
went through it and there were several errors . On page 8 is a
typo error it should be "medium" not "mexium" .
J . MacNeil : On the last part of Don Payne ' s he says the McLean area is now
medium . I really think it should be low intensity not medium .
The Post Office and Fire Station are the only businesses there
now other than the Elm Tree .
Some discussion was held on this by R . Gleason ,
J . MacNeil and others .
on 1 on
Mr . MacNeil said he thought this was a good time to change
that McLean area from medium to low intensity and Mr .
Gleason said they could go into that later .
R . Gleason : On page 10 where Mr . Evans is , talking the space should be
"building " and " zoning permit . "
On page 12 the blank should be filled in with " lending "
before institutions .
R . Gleason : Are there any other additions or corrections to the minutes ?
If not they stand approved as corrected .
Do we have any reports ? Old business ? The only old business
is the Catholic Church is not proceeding with their subdivision .
As I understand it now they are going to sell it as a unit and
then the new buyer will subdivide is so we won ' t be involved
with it at the present time .
We have to elect officers this evening . so , - - should we wait
awhile to see if any other members turn up later ? Don won ' t be
here tonight . " I thought George and Cecil would be . 0 . K . , I
guess we ' re ready for your material , Gary .
G . Evans : I want to apologize for being late tonight . I stopped in the
Town of Dryden to look at a sign that somebody wants permission
to put up . Obviously it ' s already up ! It ' s higher than permitted
and closer to the road than permitted so he wants a variance to
let it stay where it is . I just don ' t know how to relate to that
sort of thing . I ' m trying to write a letter to the Board , who
are meeting to consider it , telling them what I think and still
being nice about it .
While I ' m in the apologetic mood will tell you I didn ' t get as
much done as I intended . One of our men was out on a conference
all week and , as a result , a lot of things from his desk ended
up on mine .
The things I brought tonight have to do with the General Regula-
tions and these are the ones that apply throughout the Town re -
gardless of what district . What I have done is to adjust the
nomenclature to fit into the facilities and activities type
classification system . I have tried to state them positively .
I am personally turned off by ordinances which concentrate on
what you cannot do and I think it causes a bad impression when
people read it so in most places - - I haven ' t caught all of
them I don ' t suppose - - but where a section starts out with
no I change it so it doesn ' t start out with no . This is a minor
point but I think it gives the whole ordinance a nicer tone , - -
something to make it a little easier to swallow .
L . Raymond ; If I understand it right , didn ' t the zoning ordinance grow out
of the public nuisance law?
G . Evans ; No , but they are related , but nuisance is something that has to
be proven on a case -by- case basis and zoning was developed to
prevent nuisances .
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G . Evans : With a couple of exceptions I have not made any attempt to change
the substance of these sections . I have simply restated them .
So , Section 500 Applicability , Section 501 Permitted Activities
and Facilities - - these are simply restatements of Section 500
and 500 . 1 of your present ordinance .
L . Raymond : How do you define development ?
G . Evans : . Why would I want to do that?
L . Raymond ; I know what the usual sense says but in some ways any change on a
piece of land is development , is that true ?
G . Evans : I think that would be one of the definitions .
L . Raymond ; We throw the word around rather loosely and I am wondering if you
have a piece of land and by cutting off the timber on it you have
altered it as far as the Town is concerned , is that development ?
Or you put drainage tile in there and change the drainage on the
land , is that development ?
G . Evans : That I can answer more easily , yes . Whether it ' s regulated or
not it ' s another matter .
R . Gleason : Regulated is what we ' re really talking about .
L . Raymond : But these apply to land use and development . It doesn ' t say the
following development or things that are defined as development
are going to be regulated . I ' m quite satisfied if there ' s a
definition on development somewhere to show what it is you ' re
talking about here .
G . Evans : This is difficult to do but the important word in there is
" throughout " .
L . Raymond : I ' m making this statement without having gone forward here to see
whether maybe development is defined more clearly further on but
I guess what I ' m saying is that although I know generally what we
are talking about , - -but development , - - I wonder if we don ' t need
a little better definition on that .
G . Evans : Is there another word you would be happier with?
J . MacNeil : Site development definition .
L . Raymond ; We ' re really talking about activities here that are altering the
character of the land some way or another that we want to regulate .
Can you say this in a way that will connect with the things we will
be worrying about that may take place on land not necessarily being
regulated like you ' re speaking of here ?
G . Evans : How about general regulations apply to site development and
establishment of activities ?
L . Raymond : That would be somewhat better in my opinion .
G . Evans : That at least uses the terms we have been working with all along .
- 3 -
J . MacNeil : Are you leaving land use in there also ?
G . Evans : I would leave that out .
Some discussion was held on this by G . Evans , J .
MacNeil , R . Gleason and others .
G . Evans : So I think , sticking with that nomenclature , "General Regulations
apply to site development and establishment of defined activities
as listed in the ordinance . "
Section 501 says that if something is permitted you say so . There ' s
nothing that is permitted by implication . You do not imply by per -
mission that something is permitted .
L . Raymond : So the mere fact that a human enters upon the scene means it ' s an
activity th1t is permitted or not permitted under the general
regulations .
G . Evans ; I ' m not sure I follow you .
L . Raymond ; 0 . K . , - - take this section of the Town and let ' s say it ' s empty .
I ' m saying here is the land situated here and O . K . human beings
enter upon the scene even if it ' s just to walk over the darn place
then , at what point , do the activities become significant
enough , - - one , two , three or four human beings that begin to do
things to this piece of land and change it , - -at what point do
those activities become significant enough that we are going to
change it? Do we really mean this that every single thing ,
every tree that ' s cut or planted is to be regulated or not , or
just certain things are to be regulated and other activities are
not ?
G . Evans : As to the Genesis question , m - the point at which the people that
live there decide they want a zoning ordinance is when it becomes
regulated . The other answer to your question is the individual
daily acts are not an activity type they are individual acts .
An activity type is an on- going continuing cluster of activities
by one or more persons with some kind of characteristic that allows
you to describe it . What you ' re saying is this whole cluster of
activities that we call residential activity type is permitted and in
the case of a cutting of a tree I think someone who lives in a
rural area and cuts a tree on their land for firewood or to make
lumber is engaging in one aspect of this residential activity .
L . Raymond ; So we separate individual actions from collective actions , is that
what you ' re saying .
G . Evans ; Noy we ' re distinguishing between individual acts instantaneously
that may take an hour or a day or two from what we ' re calling
activity type which is a cluster of individual acts . It ' s a tree
versus a forest issue , I believe .
L . Raymond : I can see there ' s a catch here .
G . Evans : One tree does not a forest make , two trees does not , three trees
do not but at some point you have a forest , where is it ?
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L . Raymond : That ' s where we define it in here . Alright , then , we ' re back
to what I started in the first place . It ' s the activities that
are defined here that are regulated .
G . Evans : O . K . , - - alright . How do you foresee stating that here .
L . Raymond : Up here - - Applicability - - I suggest general regulations would
apply , - -we can say development if we want as long as somewhere or
another it is defined either here or elsewhere to mean activities
listed in the ordinance .
G . Evans : 0 . K .
R . Gleason : I don ' t know .
M . Adams ; I think this is a picayune thing in our little Town , to me .
I can see what you ' re driving at .
R . Gleason : Let ' s go on and , Gary , maybe you can come up with new enlightening
ideas the next time , can we do it that way ?
Further discussion was held on this by G . Evans , J .
MacNeil , L . Raymond and others .
J . Bell : O . K . I have so far "General regulations apply throughout the
Town of Groton . . . " what comes next ?
G . Evans : to those site developments and establishments of activities which
are recognized , defined and . . . . . - - I have to do more work on it .
0 . K . , - -how about the next page 502 . 0 etc . This is not new . This
is something that was presented last Fall at about our second or
third meeting I think so if you want to discuss this further we
certainly can but it has already been reviewed once .
R . Gleason ; There ' s one thing here that says "retail " . Did we differentiate
between retail and wholesale ? Down at. 502 . 3 dl Did we leave the
other out purposely or is there another place ?
G . Evans : Alright , - -how about let ' s jimmy around Section 335 Agricultural
Activities No . - 3 under that is Commercial Farm Headquarters Activities
and it starts out "handling and storage of farm products " . Handling
is a word which came into english from scandinavian language and to
handle meant commercial transactions but I think we have to be more
specific here .
R . Gleason : What I was thinking is , I might say I want to set up a retail
agricultural tractors business and someone could come in and
want to start up a commercial one .
G . Evans : What I ' m suggesting is you say "handling and storage of farm pro -
ducts " . If you ' re talking about farm machinery you ' re in the wrong
activity group , you should be talking about commercial agricultural
activities .
R . Gleason : 0 . K .
G . Evans ; What you ' re getting at in Section 502 . 3 ( d ) is roadside stands , I believe .
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R . Gleason : 0 . K . , - - this is where going on down through you don ' t see the
whole picture .
G . Evans : Any further discussion on that page ?
R . Gleason : Now , we are talking in this about general terms , or are we talking
about a specific area in this 502 - 503 ?
G . Evans : This would apply in any district and 502 . 3 ( d ) was put in there in
response to the question about whether agricultural activities needed
a permit when the facilities were already there . An existing non-
residential facility- - can you store hay in that barn without a
permit ? And the point of this is that if it is an existing facility
yes you can use it for agricultural purposes without a permit except
that retail agricultural sales activity , which=is the roadside stand ,
does require a permit .
R . Gleason : What I ' m trying to do is tie it in with what we have in the differ -
ent things and I ' m just wondering if we have - - this thing - - we ' re
covered , - - O . K .
G . Evans : I ' m not sure what your concern is .
i
R . Gleason : It seems we have specified a certain retail activity .
G . Evans : Yes , as requiring a zoning permit . In some districts it might re -
quire a special permit and in some a zoning permit but this says it
has to have a permit , one or the other kind .
R . Gleason : In other words if it didn ' t call for a zoning permit or a special
permit in the zone then this would apply , is that right?
G . Evans : You have the list of agricultural activities in 335 . There are
5 agricultural activities and what this is saying is that all of
those , except retail agricultural sales , ircan be established in
an existing facility without a permit . This one , however , retail
agricultural sales requires a permit .
L . Raymond : I thought some of those activities we were just permitting , weren ' t
we , in the agricultural zone ?
M . Adams : According to this every roadside stand has to have a permit , right ?
I thought we had said they didn ' t need it .
L . Raymond : Yes , - - that it was just going to be permitted .
M . Adams : I don ' t feel that everybody that sells things at the side of a road
should have to have a permit .
Some discussion was held on this by R . Gleason , G .
Evans and others .
R . Gleason : O . K . , - - I guess it ' s O . K . then . Section 503 Health Department approval .
- 6 -
R . Gleason : Section 504 - - I think there was something in the revised
zoning ordinance a year or two ago that took that section
out .
G . Evans : I certainly wouldn ' t recommend that anyone have that section
in their ordinance .
R . Gleason : I think it was taken out when we went to the lot size and all
that .
G . Evans : Would you like to just delete this , then?
R . Gleason : Maybe we should just check it out because I ' m pretty sure it
was taken out . Maybe we should have it in there but maybe
it ' s something that will never be operational here .
Some discussion was held on this by R . Gleason , L .
Raymond and others .
G . Evans : I ' ll just put a question mark by this . I was just assuming it
was in because it was in the copy of the ordinance that I have .
Section 505 Lot Dimensions - the first paragraph all I did
was state it positively instead of negatively , and the second
paragraph is really just a statement of a judicial principle to
the effect that a lot of record must be allowed to be developed
unless it is ` owned by the owner of the adjoining land . This is
just a restatement of your present Section 500 . 3 .
R . Gleason : 505 would be 500 ?
G . Evans ; Yes . Now the next section in yourexisting ordinance says :
" for the purpose of this ordinance . . . . . . . . . . . . . " I deleted
the part about mobile homes and single family residences
because it seemed to me that it was covered . However there
is nothing wrong with some redundancy so if you prefer I ' ll
put it in the same format .
R . Gleason : I would think myself if we could leave it out , it would be
0 . K . What would your feelings be here , people?
J . MacNeil : I think it can be permitted . I don ' t think it needs to be there
either . I think it ' s satisfactory without it .
M . Adams ; Uh -huh .
Lyle Raymond : I wasn ' t listening , - - I was on Section 508 figuring out something .
Would you restate the question ?
R . Gleason : We left out the section defining mobile homes .
L . Raymond ; 0 . K .
G . Evans : Section 506 is just a restatement of Section 500 . 5 and all I did
there was to say non- residential activity , - - instead of non-
residential use .
Section 507 - Yard Requirements . Almost no change from the
existing except that I stated it positively and omitted "shall " .
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G . Evans : I don ' t like " shall , "
Section 508 , are you ready ?
L . Raymond : I was only , - - at the time you were talking , - - I was looking at the
meters and feet that was all , - - they don ' t jive ,
G . Evans : No , - - they are approximate .
L . Raymond : Wouldn ' t it be better to have it say to the nearest tenth ? The
last one here 20 ft / 6 meters - - there ' s a 2 - 3 ft . discrepancy
there .
R . Gleason : It ' s less than a foot .
L . Raymond : Well , - -maybe . Sometimes , if it ' s a tree , it makes a difference .
R . Gleason : How did you define field crops and so on in this ?
G . Evans : What ? I think 6 meters and 20 ft . are almost the same .
M . Adams : 19 .
G . Evans : The 3 to 1 is off by 3 " and the 6 / 20 is off by about 2 " . As I
have said I would prefer going cold turkey on this whole thing
and as far as your corn you would just have to plant some
stubby variety in this clear vision area .
The last sentence here says that a fence or planting that does
not conform must be made to conform within one year .
Some discussion was held on this by R . Gleason , L .
Raymond , J . MacNeil , M . Adams and G . Evans .
R . Gleason : I think maybe we should put something in here , and I could be
affected by it too , but there ' s a point . It certainly is just
a matter of planting it and once it ' s up so high you could trim
some off at the corner if you had to . But actually the way it
is written now you say a farmer has a year to become in conformance
and by then he would be anyways .
G . Evans : But a year from then , you ' re in violation again .
R . Gleason : But you have another year because it ' s a new planting ,
G . Evans : Does this raise any hackles ? "For reasons of traffic safety no
structure , fence , or vegetation or agricultural crop over 3 feet /
1 meter in height etc . etc . " And the last sentence "Any fence
or planting that does not conform must be brought into conformance . "
It leaves out structural and it leaves out agricultural crops .
Further discussion was held on this by R . Gleason , L .
Raymond and G . Evans .
G . Evans : What say instead of "planting " we use "vegetation " ?
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G . Evans ; There ' s a considerable problem of this sort in the Village of
Trumansburg and they have recently rewritten their ordinance
and what they have done is say this clear vision area the low
growing shrubs can be 3 ft . high but that trunks of trees are
exempt from that regulation because you can see through there
among the trunks of the treas .
J . MacNeil ; That ' s not true .
Further discussion was held on this by J . MacNeil , L .
Raymond , R . Gleason , G . Evans and others .
G . Evans ; I think the Town ' s responsibility extends clear across the
right - of-way .
R . Gleason ; But on a corner I ' m sure they have taken more for their right -
of-way . They tended to make the curves rounded a little more .
Do you follow my reasoning ? So if you took a point from the
middle to the corner you would find there would be an area where
you might have the road beyond the right - of-way . The reason I ' m
thinking about it is I know the Town has gone in and cut some
brush back farther than their right - of -ways . Then the question
arises if the Town is going to do it in one place - -
G . Evans ; I would assume the Town Highway Department would do it where they
think it ' s a traffic hazard . It might be argued that this would
be their responsibility .
R . Gleason ; Than what would happen if it ' s on a Town or State Road ? Maybe
we should talk to the Town Board or make some notes on it so the
Town can look into it . Yes , guess that is the way to resolve it
to make some notes so when the Town Board reviews it ask them
what - -
L . Raymond : I think it ' s especially wild vegetation that comes up , - - that should
be the Town ' s responsibility plus , the owners . There are a lot of
corners not owned by farmers necessarily .
Further discussion was held on this by L . Raymond ,
R . Gleason and others .
G . Evans ; Section 509 - is the same as you have now in Section 500 . 10 .
Your present ordinance , Section 500 . 11 , seemed to be more
appropriate in the article establishing districts because it
has to do with an instance where a lot is defined by a district
boundary line and this , in my opinion , fits in with material on
interpretation , alteration of the map , so I just left it out .
Section 510 - Excavations - is the same as your Section 500 , 12 ,
And Sections 511 , 512 and 513 are the same as what you have at
the present time .
J . MacNeil ; Is there a limit on the number of vehicles abandoned or in-
operative?
R . Gleason ; There is somewheres - - two cars , I believe . Now there was some
revision in the old ordinance in regard to the definition of farm
machinery or something as to what constitutes junk .
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G . Evans : Trying to distinguish between good junk and bad junk ?
R . Gleason : Yes .
M . Adams : You never know when you ' ll need a part and it ' s right there
on that junk .
R . Gleason : We have a junkyard ordinance .
G . Evans ; Let ' s see if I have a copy of it . Ah - - ordinance for licensing
and regulating junkyards .
Mr . Evans read aloud the definition of a junkyard .
G . Evans : 0 . K . , I think this is intended for junk vehicles
and maybe farm machinery , too .
R . Gleason ; There are some provisions in the old ordinance referring to
some farm machinery and other things and I realize there ' s a
difference in viewpoint but still and all it ' s come to my
attention in years past that some farmers have gotten into
trouble doing some things that were kind of incorrect on farms .
I do think something should be recognized at least in the
agricultural area .
G . Evans : Maybe then it ' s inappropriate to talk about vehicles at all in
this section "abandoned or inoperable vehicles " since it is
covered .
Further discussion was held on this by R . Gleason , J .
MacNeil , G . Evans and others .
G . Evans ; There ' s a distinction that one could possibly make between rubbish
and junk . Would you like to discuss this for awhile?
M . Adams : What ' s the difference ? Go ahead .
G . Evans : Junk is stuff that could possibly be reused , rubbish is stuff
that really can ' t be used for anything . It ' s abandoned stuff
that ought to be hauled away to the dump . Admittedly that ' s a
subjective evaluation .
L . Raymond ; It could be used , - -possibly recycled .
R . Gleason : That ' s another thing , - -we have two old machines out there for
parts . We ' re recycling a lot of pieces and that ' s good economics .
G . Evans : We ' re talking in part about appearance . So maybe you would like
to see something in terms of appearance .
R . Gleason : The rest of our ordinance is based on standards , not on absolutes ,
in a lot of cases . Maybe we should have appearance .
L . Raymond : Prevailing standards of the neighborhood or something- -
R . Gleason ; That ' s a hard one , too .
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J . MacNeil : Why don ' t we scrub that for the time being and think about it ?
R . Gleason : Let ' s give it some thought .
G . Evans : There ' s a category performance standard which has to do with
appearance and maintenance of yards and so on and if you were
to state something about maintaining the appearance of the
part of the property that adjoins public right -of-way or is
visible to the public , say- - -
R . Gleason ; If we could come up with something . I think we have to have
something that - - it ' s obvious that we ' re not New Rochelle
or some place like that - - well , maybe we can come up with
something else .
G . Evans : The last page of the handout I gave you is a couple of pages I
left out when I typed it the first time . The first one is
Porches and Covered Terraces - - this is a restatement of your
present section 500 . 7 . This is just referring to the question
of whether a porch is part of the building or part of the yard
and what this says is that it ' s part of the yard . If you en-
close it , though , then it ' s part of the building .
And then the next one - Fences and Walls - is a restatement of
Section 500 . 8 of your present ordinance .
R . Gleason : I guess I have to ask one question on porches and covered
terraces . In other words you could put a porch on the side - -
just a roof and that wouldn ' t be counted in your side distance
to your boundary and so on ?
G . Evans : You ' re right , it would not be counted .
R . Gleason : What about an open carport ?
G . Evans : That ' s the same .
R . Gleason ; So somebody does that - - what is it , - - there ' s s square footage
where you don ' t have to get a permit ?
J . MacNeil ; 10 x 10 .
R . Gleason : So they have a porch with a roof on it and decide to winterize
it and put aluminum windows on it and they now have an enclosed
porch and are in violation . A person could inadvertently do
that very easily . I wonder if there is any way that could be
flagged in some way so at least the zoning officer would have
something - - maybe I ' m worrying about something that isn ' t a
problem .
G . Evans ; Uh -huh . Well , the reason for the side yard restrictions is
crowding of buildings on an adjacent lot and you might even
say it has to do with light and air and I think a roof that
doesn ' t have walls casts just as black a shadow as ones with
walls so , from the point of view of light , a covered porch or
terrace should be part of the building . You can ' t say it
crowds the other lot but , as you mentioned , once you have that
roof there wouldn ' t it be a good idea just to put up a
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m
G . Evans : little windbreak here .
J . MacNeil : Or screen it in .
G . Evans : Or maybe some storage cabinets to put all of those garden tools
in and so on . The first thing you know you have what appears to
be an attached garage or an enclosed porch or family room or
something . So I don ' t see any great advantage in exempting a
covered terrace or porch from being a part of the building .
R . Gleason : This was in the old one ?
G . Evans : Yes , I haven ' t changed anything .
Some discussion was held on this by L . Raymond , R . Gleason ,
M . Adams , G . Evans and others .
G . Evans : What I would suggest would be to simply delete the word "not " .
Mr . Evans read aloud : "In determining the percentage of
open space required or the size of yards , porches or covered
terraces , open at the sides , but roofed , are considered part
of the building . "
R . Gleason : On Section 500 , have we covered this ?
G . Evans : No , we have the part on parking and so on .
M . Adams : What ' s this about Danby ?
G . Evans : Some sample stuff I brought along .
R . Gleason : Do you think the idea of taking out the "not " and making it "are
considered a part of the building " is O . K?
J . MacNeil : I think you ought to also include a deck , - - it ' s the same thing as
a porch .
R . Gleason : This is my opinion , - -when anybody starts anything , - - I certainly
think that people ought to be aware of certain regulations about
side yard requirements and so on . If they can start something
without a permit there ' s no review on it .
G . Evans : You ' re suggesting the next section "Fences and Walls " - -
unroofed porches , terraces or similar features should also be
part of the building ?
J . MacNeil : To me a deck should be considered the same as a porch only it ' s not
covered but this is something that is being added on and should be
covered by at least a building permit or something .
G . Evans : 0 . K .
R . Gleason : I don ' t like the way it ' s written - - if we took out the not "
and it ' s considered part of the building than that might mean
O . K . somebody couldn ' t put a porch on if it didn ' t meet sideline
requirements .
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G . Evans : Than they ought to be able to get a variance .
R . Gleason : O . K . , and when they do they can be told O . K . you can put a porch
on there but you can ' t make it into a room later on .
G . Evans : Well , actually they could get a variance to put a room on and if
there was sufficient reason to — on
L . Raymond : You can put anything you want up as long as it ' s not permanent .
Some discussion was held on this by L . Raymond ,
R . Gleason , J . MacNeil and others .
R . Gleason : Can we come up with something ? There ' s one alternative , - - can we
reword that whole thing and make it — On I don ' t know just how?
G . Evans : Can you just tell me what your intentions are in this regard and
I ' ll make note of it and maybe write something up and bring it
back next time . . Let ' s look at these two together . The question
is the significance of a roof . Is that to be included as part of
the overall bulk of the building or not ? Another point is the
significance of fences or walls and one feeling here might be that
an opague wall 6 ' high or higher eventually extends the perimeter
of the walls of the building so it might be considered part of the
building if it ' s simply a fence you can see through , it ' s not .
A third point is things where it ' s something down below but not
something up above . Steps , - -unroofed porches , - - terraces - - similar
things . They seem to be three separate things but if you take
the roof , the wall and the floor you have a building so we ' re talking
about three separable components of a building . If you have an
established building and can put one of these on , does this make more
building or not ? If you put two of them up - - a deck and a 6 ' wall
around it , does this mean more building or not ? Now I think we can
agree if you have the floor , walls and roof on , you have a building .
If you put the roof and one wall I would say you have an attached
garage and I think that is part of the building so it ' s a combination
of things - - which do you want to consider part of the building and
which do you not want to ?
J . MacNeil : I think we should think about it some . It ' s just not worded right .
R . Gleason : It just doesn ' t suit me and I don ' t just know what to do about it .
J . MacNeil : This open at the sides isn ' t right in there either . How can you
have a porch that is open at the sides ? It doesn ' t say how many
sides .
R . Gleason : Actually , my concern is building a porch per se wasnp- as much my
concern as building a porch and then it was continued and made into
something else which would throw it out of compliance with other
parts of the ordinance
Further discussion was held on this by L . Raymond ,
J . MacNeil , G . Evans and others .
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R . Gleason : What I had in mind is - - I would say we could allow a porch to
be- - built but should allow them to be built provided that - - but
I think , too , it should be by permit so the enforcement officer
can inspect it and say will allow you to build an open porch but
that ' s it because if you put anything else on it , it becomes a part
of the house and you haven ' t got enough side lot requirements and then
the person would know what they were getting into . Maybe we have to
spell out what we mean .
L . Raymond ; Even if you just had a porch with a roof on it , everything open in the
full sense of the wordf and there was a risk to someone else ' s
property say water came down in the wrong place that could cause trouble ,
- - if he had a driveway and it created a flow of water . I ' ve become
aware of that because we have been told the water flow from our lot
is going down to lots below us so I became aware about changing the
flow of water inadvertently and if it ' s such a situation that the
porch is going to be a bother to someone next to them it could cause
erosion or a small ditch in a way they wouldn ' t like even though all
you have is a roof so , in that case , I suppose on those grounds I
would say maybe there should be some - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - of the porch
situation .
R . Gleason : I think maybe we should think about it and next time take it up from
there .
G . Evans : I ' ll see if I can find some models in other ordinances where they have
dealt with porches and decks and so on .
R . Gleason : Maybe that would be best . I can see the point where wouldn ' t want
an inspector running out all the time and pay a fee of $ 25 to build a leanto
on their house . There ' s a point at which enforcement has its limits .
G . Evans ; O . K . , - - I ' ll see what I can find and we can discuss it more later .
The remainder of the handout I gave you this evening - - I would like
to describe what its intentions are . This is Section 514 which goes
on for about three pages . This is an attempt to translate your exist -
ing parking regulations into the nomenclature of the activity classi -
fication system . In other words , on the left I ' ve listed all the
residential building types on the first page and then on the second
page non- residential activity types and then on the right the number
of required parking places for each of those categories .
Now there are problems and that is there are activity types which are
permitted but no parking regulations which apply to them in the
existing ordinance .
I put this together trying to find some pattern which would allow us
to simplify things a little bit and I haven ' t discovered any pattern
yet .
The page that has Trumansburg scrawled at the top is an illustration
of a parking regulation which does have the kind of pattern I ' m re -
ferring to where commercial activities are clustered together and the
first 18 have all the same parking regulations applying to them and
so on .
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G . Evans : Industrial activities all have the same parking regulations applying
to them . Up at the top of that page - Civic Activities - the various
civic activity categories on the left have a more complex set of
parking regulations for them like , for instance , community education one
per employee plus l per student over 16 years old . This , of course ,
applies only to the school and I don ' t know how they can impose those
regulations on the school district but that shows their intentions .
The last page , which has Danby scrawled at the top is a different type
of parking regulation and is one which I think you ought to seriously
consider . It doesn ' t talk about the different facilities and
activity types . It has a single parking regulation formula that
applies regardless and it allows for the situation where you have a
combination of activities , - 2 parking spaces per dwelling unit plus
1 parking space per rooming unit , plus 1 parking space for every 2
residents in group quarters and so on . Now this may not be the
formula that you would want .
R . Gleason : That ' s what I was wondering and that could be applied against anything .
The only thing that comes to mind is where we said something about
incidential retail sales .
G . Evans : You mean home occupations that are covered here under Item 57 Let me
see , - -O . K . I see now why it isn ' t clear - - Section 311 . 3 in the
Danby ordinance is the whole list of commercial activities , section
312 is home occupations so to translate this into the Groton situation
you would say per 400 square feet of floor space used for a commercial
activity including commercial activities such as home occupations .
R . Gleason : O . K . , - - is there anything else ?
G . Evans : At the next meeting I ' ll try to have prepared the translation of your
fire regulations into this same nomenclature and I also - - I ' m
stepping beyond the original charge now but in looking over your
section on non - conforming uses it seemed to me there are some things that
warrant review and so I thought I would bring some model sections on
non - conformance and we could discuss those . Specifically I think that
your present ordinance alleges that the Board of Zoning Appeals has some
powers that it doesn ' t really have . O . K . I have run my tape .
R . Gleason : Any other comments ?
J . MacNeil : I move the meeting be adjourned .
M . Adams : I second the motion . Motion carried .
The meeting adjourned at 10 : 25 P . M .
Respectfully submitted ,
Jose ine Bell
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