WESTFIELD – A Pontoosic Road resident will request the Planning Board to approve a special permit to allow construction of one residence during a public hearing slated for the board’s meeting tonight.
The special permit petition and review is routine business for the Planning Board, but not in this case where the petitioner, Henry Bannish of 225 Pontoosic Road, is seeking the special permit for an open space flag lot.
Bannish, the vice chairman of the Conservation Commission, is seeking that open space flog lot designation for 8.44 acres of land zoned for rural residential uses and which is completely within the aquifer zone II protection area.
Bannish’s petition is being presented to the Planning Board by Rob Levesque of R. Levesque Associates, Inc.
“This one is kind of cool,” Levesque said last night. “It’s the first (open space flag lot petition) to go to the Planning Board. Hopefully it goes well, but you always wonder if it will because it is something they haven’t seen before this.”
Levesque said that Principal Planner Jay Vinskey suggested that they petition for the open space flag lot designation because Bannish proposes to create one two-acre building lot and to seek a conservation easement, to be granted to the city, for the remaining 6.44 acres in perpetuity for conservation purposes.
The property is in the estate of Jean Bannish and abuts the Southwick town line on the south property line. The odd-shaped parcel abuts Magnolia to the north and both Laro Circle and Canal Drive on the west.
Levesque has a prominent role at the board’s meeting tonight also representing the developer of the 10-lot Bent Tree subdivision which was approved by the Planning Board, but who is seeking a minor modification to the accepted plan.
The 10-lot development on 28 acres of land off Montgomery Road is being developed by Mark Bergeron of Bent Tree Development, LLC. The preliminary subdivision plan was approved by the board in February and the definitive plan at the board’s May 20 meeting.
The definitive plan is the document that will be filed with the Registry of Deeds along with the Mylar drawings signed by the Planning Board members. The document includes the board’s findings, condition and waivers.
The developer is asking the board to lift a requirement to install a four-foot chain-link fence included in the original plan as a condition for approving the special permit.
Bergeron argued that instead of installing the fence he would decrease the slops of the retention pond, changing the proposed 3 to 1 slope to a 4 to 1 slope and that the fence looks institutional.
“I’d like to put something in that is more natural,” Bergeron said at the board’s last meeting, adding that maintenance of the fence will be difficult and that, over time, it would become overgrown.
Levesque will also present changes to the special permit application for 99 Springfield Road representing Julie and Nabil Hannoush who purchased the former car dealership property and are seeking to redevelop that land which borders the Westfield River.
The original plan, submitted to the Planning Board by Levesque, included a stormwater retention basin on land abutting the north bank of the river. That plan called for removal of a large number of trees in the buffer zone between the property and river and creation of a retention basin.
The Conservation Commission and the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) opposed the tree removal, even though it is allowed under state environmental law, and modification of the stromwater management plan, which has to be approved by the Planning Board as an element of the special permit.
The Conservation Commission then signed off on the environmental permit and condition.
“The DEP did have some concerns that we were going to be disturbing forest and the riverfront area,” Levesque said. “We’re proposing to excavate a small area behind the existing retention basin to compensate for lost storage.”
The special permit petition includes renovations to the existing building and construction of three retail buildings at 99 Springfield Road, the former home of a Balise car dealership.
“We’ve updated the plans, revised the building footprints,” Levesque said. “The bank will now be a standalone building.”
