16 Condos OK’d For City Point

A Stratford-based builder won permission to construct 16 more condos in City Point as part of the final phase of development for the Breakwater Bay Condominiums.

Local land-use commissioners granted that approval Wednesday night during the latest regular monthly meeting of the City Plan Commission, which was held online via Zoom.

The commissioners voted unanimously in support of a site plan and coastal site plan for the construction of a three-story, 16-unit residential building in the RM‑1 zone and coastal management area at 200 Harbour Close.

That waterfront property is currently home to a gated-in complex containing two four-story, 32-unit condo buildings. Per Wednesday night’s now-approved site plan, Stratford-based developer Anthony Nizzardo intends to add a third and final 16-unit condo building to that complex. (Click here to read a previous article by the New Haven Register’s Mark Zaretsky about this project.)

“Currently, the site is an open field,” project engineer Zach Georgina told the commissioners Wednesday night about where this new proposed 16-unit building would be constructed. ​“It is the final phase of the Breakwater Bay Condominiums.”

While the two other condo buildings were constructed in 2007, he said, this planned third one was not. ​“They cleared the site, prepped the foundation, installed utility ties, and covered it.” Ever since, this site has ​“sat there as a field” with grass on top.

The new development will have 35 on-site parking spaces, he said. That’s more than double the 16 parking spaces required by zoning law.

Why add so many more parking spots than are required? Westville Alder and City Plan Commissioner Adam Marchand asked.

There’s ​“no designated street parking” on the private road that leads to this condo complex, Georgina said. So, if one of the 16 condo owners has a guest visit, ​“where are they going to park?” By building two parking spaces per unit — plus a few more to account for wider accessible parking spaces — ​“they would essentially have a visitor spot and an assigned spot.”

“It certainly is an amenity that many residents will appreciate, having enough parking for guests,” Marchand said. ​“But we are so close to the Sound…” He said the number of parking spaces in comparison to the number of residential units being built did make him think about the impervious surface impacts of having so much paved space so close to the water. ​“But of course, you meet the ordinance requirements” in regards to impervious surface coverage, he said.

And with that, all of the commissioners present voted unanimously in support of the project application.