The planning board advanced the idea of a high-density transit village to be built near the Red Bank rail station. Below, homeowner Neil Spencer reviews a zone map with engineer Catherine Britell while his wife, Wendy, addresses the board. (Click to enlarge)
Suggested changes to Red Bank’s master plan won unanimous approval for the second time in two months last night, but not before comments and questions from the citizenry forced a rethinking of some details and a fuller explanation of others.
In a do-over of a sparsely attended public hearing held December 15, planning board members sought to convey the message that new, apparently high density limits would in fact result in fewer residences being built than might be allowed if present regulations were unchanged.
The board also stuck to the essentials of the plan’s most controversial element: a new zone surrounding the borough’s train station to encourage the creation of a high-density transit village of stores and residences.
Up to 35 units per acre could be built in structures up to 50 feet tall if the borough council heeds the recommendation, which backers argued is consistent with the goals of New Jersey’s so-called Smart Growth plan.
“It really does foster those smart growth principles in an environmentally sensitive way,” said borough engineer Christine Ballard, of T&M Associates. “If we don’t start getting in line with state ideals, then we won’t get the state support we need.”
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In mostly civil tones, residents questioned the extent to which the board took into account the impact of such high densities on borough water and sewer systems, as well as traffic. Former council member Grace Cangemi said the transit village would be detrimental to her neighborhood, along Rector Place, by loading numerous new rental units onto one with a high number of vacancies. And Jennifer Barons of Oakland Street challenged the assumption that homes near railroad stations encourage greater use of mass transit.
“I wouldn’t really bank on it,” said Barons, a former commuter. Few of her neighbors ride the rails, she said.
But former Mayor Ed McKenna, now the chairman of the state Planning Commission, said Red Bank was a model of planning being emulated and studied across the state, and exhorted the board to “stay the course” on the transit village concept.
“You’re ahead of the curve,” he said.
The master plan re-examination report at the center of the hearing also imposes density limits on a zone that includes Wallace Street, where the recently completed Metropolitan condos stand, at 46 units per acre, said board vice chairman Dan Mancuso. The new rules would top future development in the zone at 25 units per acre.
“We looked at this and said, ‘how can we have some teeth in our ordinances going forward?'” he said.
In some cases, the recommendations reduce the de-facto densities created by a slew of recent zoning board variances, while others impose limits that hadn’t before existed, planners said.
“You won’t see another project downtown like Wallace Street,” said board member and borough Administrator Stanley Sickels.
Over more than two hours of polite exchanges, the board also deflected a request by architect Ned Gaunt for a prohibition on first-floor residential usages on Monmouth Street, a change that Mancuso said would unfairly burden property owners who already have street-level residences.
It also shot down a request by developer Patrick Nulle, a partner in a planned project at Pearl and Monmouth streets, to expand the zone to cover half a square mile his property included.
The biggest victory of the night may have been scored by Wendy and Neil Spencer, who live at the corner of Monmouth Street and Shrewsbury Avenue. They expressed concern that their home, which was included in the overlay zone without any notification to them, could find itself next door to a 50-foot tall structure or be taken in an eminent domain action.
As he has been forced to repeat often since calling attention to the transit village concept on January 1, Mayor Pasquale Menna reiterated that eminent domain has never been used or contemplated in the two decades he’s been involved in borough government, and won’t be as long as he’s mayor.
Still, the board agreed to excise the Spencers’ home from the zone.
Afterward, Wendy Spencer said she was unaware that her property had been included in the proposed overlay zone until she read about the re-hearing on redbankgreen Tuesday.
“It was very fruitful,” she said of her appearance at the session.
Here’s the Master Plan Re-examination Report Download 2008 Master Plan.
The 1995 Master Plan and the 2002 re-examination are available at the borough website’s planning documents page.
