Thomas Breen photo
141 Ogden: Soon home to single-family house?
The owner of a long-vacant Prospect Hill lot won permission to construct a new five-bedroom single-family house and attached garage on the site of a former wetlands.
That was the outcome of a recent regular monthly City Plan Commission meeting, which took place online via Zoom.
The local land-use commissioners voted unanimously in support of an inland wetlands application by Che Tiernan to construct a single-family residence at 141 Ogden St.
According to Tiernan’s site plan and inland wetlands application, the Orange-based property owner plans to construct a two-story, five-bedroom house with an attached two-car garage and driveway.
Construction should begin “soon after approval” of the inland wetlands review, according to the application. “Estimated construction timeline is 6 months.”
Single-family house construction plans don’t typically make their way before the City Plan Commission. That’s because the city’s zoning code requires site plan approval only if a residential development has three or more dwelling units.
The commissioners got to weigh in on the 141 Ogden St. plan at this meeting in late April because of another provision of the city zoning code gives City Plan the power to review “all activity within 50 feet of inland wetlands or watercourse,” as city zoning director William Long said.
Which is the case with 141 Ogden St.
Luke Sofair, the project’s engineer, told the commissioners that “a 30-foot band of wetlands” soil runs through the center of the currently vacant 0.36-acre lot.
This is a “relic wetlands,” he said, that “predates residential development in this area.” It has “limited functionality as a wetlands today.”
He said that Tiernan, who bought the property in 2016, plans to build a new single-family, 2,338-square-foot house with a patio in the back and an attached garage on this site. The proposed new driveway and utility crossings will cut through the current wetlands.
Sofair also pointed out that the City Plan Commission approved a “substantially” similar inland wetlands application for this site back in 2014 under the property’s previous owner.
That permit has subsequently expired. Thus Tiernan’s returning to the commission with the renewed, similar application.
Zoom photo
Site plan and planting plan (below) for 141 Ogden St.
Just to be clear on what “vestigial wetlands” means, Westville Alder and City Plan Commissioner Adam Marchand said: “There was a condition at some point that brought water to that site, and that’s no longer the case? It’s not an active wetlands?”
That’s correct, Tiernan said. He stressed that whatever wetlands did exist on the site likely predated residential development in the area. “This is the only vacant lot for blocks around,” he said. “Houses on either side of the property [have] been constructed within the wetlands. There are houses on both sides.”
Marchand pointed out that this site is on the side of a hill. “There’s not an active waterway, like a stream or a brook or a spring” on the site currently? he asked.
No, Tiernan replied.
And you’re proposing to restore some of the characteristics of the wetland as part of this single-family house construction project? Marchand asked.
Yes, Tiernan said.
“We are proposing to remove approximately two feet of top soil and replace it with eight inches of wetland soil removed from the driveway crossing.” He said the property owner will also be planting some “native wetland shrubs” on the site.
He also said the property owner will also add a “curtain drain and swale” to catch runoff that makes it to the southeast property line, to compensate for the addition of impervious surface to the site.
Before voting in support of the proposal, Marchand praised the plan. “I think it’s commendable that the owner has decided to stick with that plan which was previously approved” and not try to further “remove the site from its former wetlands state.”
Commissioner Carl Goldfield and Vice-Chair Ed Mattison agreed.
It’s a “commendable plan to do what they can now that the wetlands has been destroyed, essentially,” Goldfield said.
“I think this is a worthwhile effort,” added Mattison. “We should support it.”
Thomas Breen photo
Looking down the Ogden St. hill, with 141 Ogden on the left.
Looks like an ideal site for a rehab center, homeless shelter, or walk-in clinic.